Elemental
by tsuki-shinigami
Summary: three girls with elemental affinities; water, fire and air, travel the land of fire after orochimaru's death they end up in konoha. How will they get along with three other konoha ninja? Will they ever find their best friend, earth?
1. Chapter 1

**Hiya! So this is my first fanfiction, I've been reading other ff's for a while now and decided to have a go at it…so yeah…enjoy? By the way English isn't my first language so I'm deeply sorry in advance for the many errors you will most likely endure…**

**Disclaimer: I do not own anything of which is naruto, that privilege is masashi kishimoto's**

**Summary: three girls with elemental affinities; water, fire and air, travel the land of fire after orochimaru's death they end up in konoha. How will they get along with three other konoha ninja? Will they ever find their best friend, earth?**

**KibaxOC nejixOC sasukexOC saixOC**

**OC FILES:**

**Nala: air affinity. Mid-length dark green hair, deep green eyes. Wears navy ninja pants and high-heeled shoes, has a navy shirt with one long sleeve and the other side sleeveless, the shirt comes up just below her chest and her stomach is wrapped up with bandages, she carries a long thin sword.**

**Date of birth: august 11th**

**Age: 16**

**Zodiac sign: Leo **

**Height: 162 cm**

**Weight: 48 kg**

**Blood type: AB**

**Favorite food: dango**

**Least favorite food: broccoli **

**Hobbies: partying, hanging out with friends**

**Sora: fire affinity. Long ink black hair ends seem to look white; it reaches the small of her back. She has jade eyes. wears a black one piece dress that reaches above her knee's, knetted leg bands with normal ninja shoes, black in color, weapons pouch wrapped around her waist, and has two swords.**

**Date of birth: July 6th**

**Age: 16**

**Zodiac sign: cancer**

**Height: 164 cm**

**Weight: 47 kg**

**Blood type: O**

**Favorite food: lollipops, ramen**

**Least favorite food: tomatoes**

**Hobbies: training, learning new jutsu's, reading **

**Hikari: water affinity. Reddish-brown colored hair reaching the mid of her back always put in a pony tail. Grey eyes. Wears temari-style robes with a blue sash, she carries one large sword on her back and small scrolls in a pouch.**

**Date of birth: November 7th **

**Age: 17**

**Zodiac sign: Scorpio**

**Height: 168 cm**

**Weight: 49**

**Blood type: A**

**Favorite foods: soups**

**Least favorite foods: anything sour**

**Hobbies: watering plants with her element**

**Talia: earth affinity. Grayish-silver hair which is really long but is kept in a bun. Forest green eyes wears a skirt and tenten style top. Large shuriken attached to her back.**

**Date of birth: November 28th **

**Age: 16**

**Zodiac sign: Sagittarius**

**Height: 165 cm**

**Weight: 48.5**

**Blood type: AB**

**Favorite foods: tomatoes, barbeque**

**Least favorite foods: sweets**

**Hobbies: walking, watching scenery**


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 1: On the Run

"That's enough Nala." Hikari sighed getting up from the rock she was sitting on.

"Aw but I'm just starting to have fun." Nala grinned, slashing the screaming ninja once more with her thin blade.

"Just kill the fucking bastard already so we can get the hell out of here." grumbled Sora.

"Fine, fine ruin all my fun why don't you." Nala rolled her eyes as she hit the ninja's vital points ending the constant screams, the three begun tree-hopping.

"We're closing in on the land of fire." Hikari noted.

"Land of fire?" Sora smirked, "sounds like my kinda place."

"Do you really think Talia will be there?" Nala wondered.

"She has to be." Hikari frowned.

"Wherever that bastards gone, she'll be there, stupid obsessed fan girl." Sora muttered.

"From here on out we stick together okay, we don't want to get separated." Hikari warned.

"Yeah, yeah." Nala waved.

~ Time skip~

"Dang, where am I?" Nala muttered looking all around, Nala suddenly heard rustling in the wind, and she tried to run away it sounded like at least four ninjas. She ended up somewhere else in the forest; she cocked her head to the side listening to the wind.

"Amateurs…kai!" she released the genjutsu; she was surprised to find that she was surrounded; she quickly unsheathed her thin sword.

"How did you know?" the woman asked she was the oldest it seemed the others were all her age.

"I don't need to tell you anything."

"Yeah maybe you'll start talking once we beat you!" one of the guys said.

"The only beating which is gonna be done around here is going to be by me, and since you're the loudest asshole I'll start with you!" Nala shot back.

"What did you call me?" he growled, "what are you gonna fight with that little thing?" he laughed at Nala's thin blade.

"You'll see how little it's gonna be once I kick your ass!"

"No way! You can't beat me!"

"Can to! Just watch me!" Nala and the boy kept arguing back and forth, while the other three ninja sweat dropped.

"Um…Kiba-kun?" the girl asked.

"Not now Hinata, I'm about to teach this chick a lesson." Kiba said.

"I'd like to see you try you…" Nala fainted on the spot, Kiba whirled around

"Shino! Aw come on man, I was gonna fight her!"

"You were taking too long, but if you insist you may carry her." Shino shrugged turning away.

"What do we do with her, Kurenai-sensei?" Hinata asked.

"Well, first we get her to Konoha, and see what the Hokage thinks; a girl like this shouldn't be out on our territory."

The four ninja and their dog didn't notice the wind rustling around them as they began making their way to their village.

"Oh fuck you Nala!" Sora cussed as the wind beat against her and Hikari.

"I told her we had to stay together." Hikari grimaced

"Where the hell is Konoha?"

"Come on Sora we have to go get Nala back."

"I don't see why we have to save her; we could just leave her and find Talia."

"Sora."

"Fine, I'm coming, I'm coming." Sora sighed as she followed Hikari.

"Ugh, my head, those cheap stakes." Nala muttered.

"Hey!"

"Oh look it's the asshole." Nala rolled her eyes; she was being carried by Kiba, over his shoulder, Kiba purposely made her jump.

"Ow, idiot!" she smacked him upside the head, she looked at her hands then, they blocked her chakra points, tch like that would stop her.

"OW! You bastard! Watch it!" she hit Kiba's back, who just laughed.

"I'll take it from here." Shino said taking Nala from Kiba, Nala just sighed and looked at the woman in front.

"Hey leader-dudette." she called, Kurenai turned around raising a brow.

"Yeah um see I don't like being manhandled, so can I just ride on the dog instead?"

Kurenai fought a laugh, this girl didn't seem dangerous at all.

"Kiba?" she asked.

"Yo Aka, that okay with you?" the dog barked once in approval, and Shino set Nala on Akamaru.

"Hello boy, aren't you the cutest." Nala snuggled against Akamaru while Kiba smirked as he looked over at the girl then frowned, he came closer and took the girls collar moving it away from her neck.

"Hey pervert, watch it before I call out attempted rape!"

Hinata turned a dark shade of red and Kiba stuttered

"I was trying to rape you, I just…" Kiba blushed slightly "Kurenai-sensei take a look at her neck!" he hollered out to save himself, Kurenai came over to Nala and looked at her neck, she backed up in surprise, _Orochimaru_, she thought.

"What's your name? Where are you from? And what do you know about orochimaru?" she immediately asked the girl.

"Whoa, whoa, sorry leader-dudette but I have the right to remain silent." Nala crossed her arms.

"Kurenai-sensei, we've reached Konoha." Shino noted, Kurenai nodded and led her team through the Konoha gates.

"Shit now they've taken her in."

"So we rescue her, tonight, first we scout the area and figure out its defense."

"Hell yeah, I love the breaking in part." Sora grinned slyly.

"Are you willing to talk now?" Tsunade asked Nala once she and Kurenai's team had come into her office, Nala shook her head.

"Kiba and Hinata please take this girl down to the torture chamber, I will contact Ibiki."

"Ooh torture chamber, that sounds cool, I wanna go!" Nala suddenly jumped up. Everyone sweat dropped, "come on dog boy, let's go!"

"Shut up." Kiba muttered as he and a nervous Hinata took the girl down to the torture chamber.

"So where does the torturing happen?" Nala asked excitedly.

"Uh…on that chair." Kiba said slowly, what the hell was wrong with this girl?

"Ooh pretty chair!" Nala ran over to the chair and sat cross legged, making herself comfortable, a puff of smoke appeared before her, revealing none other than Ibiki.

"Hi, I'm the person who you'll be torturing." Nala waved comically.

Ibiki looked at Kiba and Hinata, "are you serious?" he pointed to the girl, Kiba and Hinata nodded.

"Aw come on! Lets get this party started already!" Nala clapped her hands together

Ibiki sighed, "I'm not going to torture you. I'm going to search your mind."

"Awwww, that's no fun." Nala pouted as Ibiki put his hand on her head and closed his eyes.

Nala began snickering as Ibiki entered her mind, a few moments later, Ibiki, the feared torture master backed away from Nala, sweating and breathing heavily, fright written all over his face.

"Ibiki-san?" Hinata asked

"There's more where that came from, and come on that wasn't even all of it." Nala grinned.

"Its awful, its god awful!"

"Oh is the little torturer petrified? I bet my friends little trick scared you good huh?" Nala crossed her arms looking proud.

Ibiki sagged to the ground as Hinata quickly went to him, he was muttering random things under his breath.

"What'd you do to him!" Kiba asked Nala.

"I gave him a taste of his own medicine; I'm disappointed I thought we'd get some real torturing going on here."

"You sadist!"

"You think I'm a sadist, damn boy do you have it wrong the real sadist amongst us…well lets just say you don't want to meet her she is a real torture expert, and she's the one whose jutsu is affecting him right now." Nala said eerily, Kiba gulp. Another puff of smoke appeared this time revealing non other than…

"Anko nee-chan!" Nala jumped up hugging Anko.

"Nala? What the hell, you're the girl they caught? Where are Hikari, Sora and Talia?"

"Anko nee-san these people were being mean to me." Nala pouted looking innocent, Kiba just gaped at the girl.

"Oh and Talia is lost were looking for her, but then I got separated from everyone and they took me in captive!" Nala pointed a finger at Kiba.

"Anko-san is that your sister?" Hinata asked.

"No not exactly, but we were really close so she and her friends always call me big sister."

"There are more of her!" Kiba groaned.

"So Anko nee-san, why don't you bust me outta here so I can go find Talia and the others?" Nala asked nudging Anko.

"Sorry Nala, but…wait isn't Talia with Sasuke?"

"Yeah, stupid Talia."

"I think its better if you stayed here, we are looking for Sasuke and we probably have more clues then you do."

"I don't know Hikari isn't here to decide and Sora isn't here to chew us all out." Nala shrugged.

"Then how bout we get them here?" Anko asked slyly.

"What do you have in mind nee-san?" Nala asked with the same sly smile, making Hinata and Kiba back away nervously from them.

"These were the guards? They're a bunch of weaklings; I didn't even get to put up a real fight." Sora pouted as Hikari jumped off from a branch.

"Sora half of them were anbu."

"Whatever lets go get Nala back."

"Yep." Hikari smiled. The two went over the konoha walls and looked around.

"There." Hikari pointed to the hokage tower, the two swiftly made their way to the tower, searching from top to bottom until they reached the basement door.

"Wait, don't you think it's a bit strange that there are no guards, or any people to that matter around?" Sora asked.

"Yeah." Hikari nodded slowly.

Nala saw Hikari and Sora burst in.

"Nala!" hikari gasped, Nala was tied to a chair, gagged, she was trying to say something but it just came out as muffled cries, Hikari came up to Nala untying her as Sora disappeared with a smirk into the shadows.

"Hikari! My hero!" nala smiled jumping into hikari's arms; suddenly the dark room was lit up all around with fire.

"Got them, what do you suppose I do?" sora grinned revealing 12 people tied together, hikari looked at them, her eyes widened.

"Anko nee-san?"

"Hey Hikari. Sora sneaky as ever I see." Anko replied.

"Thanks nee-san." Sora grinned, rubbing her nails on her shirt smugly.

"What's wrong with these chicks!" Kiba was trying to break free.

"I am the Hokage I demand that you release me at once!" Tsunade growled.

"Aw sorry my bad, didn't know you were the good guys." Sora said sheepishly untying the rope, the girls except Sora all gave Anko a hug.

"I guess our plan didn't work huh Anko nee-san?" Nala grinned.

"Nala!" Sora and Hikari groaned.

"What it sounded like fun." Nala shrugged.

"You three and Anko, in my office now! Everyone else go home!" Tsunade yelled

The three girls and Anko went to Tsunade's office, sitting in chairs.

"Okay care to explain Anko?" Tsunade asked once she was seated in her chair.

"Right well these are Hikari." Anko introduced them.

"Hello."

"Nala."

"Hiya!"

"And Sora."

"Yo."

"They were just little children when I was with Orochimaru before he released me, and I was taking care of them. Orochimaru wanted them for a very special reason…well they have a fourth but she is missing along with Sasuke."

Tsunade raised a brow at this as she progressed everything.

"We have affinities for the four elements, I for water, Nala for air, Sora for fire and Talia for earth." Hikari explained.

"And you all have cursed marks?" Tsunade asked.

"Yeah, Orochimaru thought he'd be able to control us with them but thanks to our affinities we never lose control of ourselves." Nala smiled.

"And what were you doing on our territory?" Tsunade then questioned.

"We had a lead on Talia, which led us here, though we were wrong and instead we all ended up in kanola." Sora shrugged.

"Konoha." every corrected her in unison.

"Whatever people." Sora waved a hand.

"Well you three are powerful; you Nala made Ibiki suffer and I suppose you two were the ones who defeated my guards and best Anbu?" Tsunade looked at Sora and Hikari.

"That would be sora." Hikari shook her head.

"Damn woman, those were your best?" Sora gaped.

Tsunade had a vein pop in her head she then sighed and looked at the three girls.

"I would like to consider joining _Konoha._" she looked at Sora who raised her hands as though surrendering "we could use you three around here and you will be able to find your friend easily since we've been keeping tabs on Sasuke and his whereabouts."

The three girls looked at each for a while almost as though having a silent conversation, Hikari then turned to tsunade, Sora sighed sagging back on her chair and Nala was jumping in her seat grinning.

"We accept." Hikari nodded.

"Great, we will meet again in the morning." Tsunade nodded. "Dismissed."

"Come on girls you can sleep at my place." Anko grinned as they walked out of Tsunade's office.

"Yay! Sleepover!" Nala clapped her hands.

"Thanks nee-san!" Hikari smiled.

"You better have food." Sora grumbled.

The four made their way to Anko's place, and Anko, Nala and Hikari set up their sleeping bags and pillows in Anko's room while Sora was raiding the kitchen, she came to the bedroom with a lollipop in her mouth.

"I've missed these so much."

"Oh that's right you always used to have a lollipop in your mouth." Anko remembered.

"You eat so much, so how do you stay so thin?" Nala asked putting a hand on Sora's stomach.

"Hey." Sora frowned smacking her hand away. Nala giggled and dove into her sleeping bag.

"Come on you guys, we have a big day ahead of us." Hikari scolded "get some sleep."

Sora and Nala nodded and slowly begun to fall asleep. Anko looked at her three 'little sisters' she smiled slightly and she fell asleep as well.

Soooo? What did you think? Good? Bad? Liked it? Hated it?

I'd love to get some feedback from those of you have taken the time to read this *not so subtle hint to review*


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter 2: Meeting the Gang

"Sora, wakey, wakey." Nala nudged Sora

"Fuck off."

"Aww don't be so crude in the morning."

"Leave me the hell alone!"

"Come on were having pancakes." Nala grinned

Sora was out of her bed in a second and in the bathroom,

"I'm awake!" she called.

Hikari shook her head as she came and sat at Anko's eating table.

"Pancakes?" Sora said as she came and sat as well.

"Just the way you like'm kiddo." Anko smiled putting a plate full of pancakes in front of Sora, who licked her lips and finished her pancakes quickly. Nala, Hikari and Anko just stared at her.

"What they're good." Sora shrugged as she got up and changed in to her ninja attire.

Once everyone was ready they left Anko's house.

"Right well I have a mission to go to, I might be back tonight if not…" Anko looked wary, as she tossed Hikari the keys to her house, "please don't trash it too badly."

"No worries, Anko nee-san." Sora smirked

"Don't you fret you just go on and have a fun mission." Nala waved

"Don't worry I'll keep them under control." Hikari rolled her eyes, Anko mouthed a thank you and the girls went to Tsunade's office.

"First off here are your forehead protectors." Tsunade said giving each girl a protector, "And today you may go around and get used to the village, meet some people until I get any word on Sasuke, your escort will be arriving shortly…"

"Granny Tsunade, what did you call me for!" came a loud voice belonging to a certain blond haired ninja.

"Uzumaki Naruto, meet Hikari, Sora and Nala, you will be their escort for today."

Naruto frowned as he looked at the girls, "They're pretty." he nodded.

"Aw he's so cute!" Nala gushed.

"A kid is going to escort us, what a sweetie." Hikari put her hands together.

"Yeah, adorable." Sora rolled her eyes.

Tsunade sweat dropped as she dismissed them.

"So Naruto -aw what a cute name! Where will you take us?" Nala asked.

"The best place in all of Konoha." Naruto grinned.

"Here we are!" Naruto opened his arms wide, Nala and Hikari sweat dropped as they read the sign 'Ichiraku Ramen'

"I like this place." Sora smirked as she took a seat and ordered food for everyone.

Just then a white dog appeared jumping on Nala.

"Akamaru! Good boy, where's doggie boy?"

"Stop calling me that" Kiba muttered.

"Doggie boy!"

"You know this guy Nala?" Sora asked standing up to look at Kiba.

"Yeah he's one of the guys that captured me!" Nala nodded brightly.

"Oh really?" Sora asked glaring at Kiba and making him cringe.

"Yup and he was very mean to me and he even hurt me" Nala was continuing.

"Uh-huh" Sora was now glaring daggers…no blades at Kiba.

"Um…please tell me this isn't the torturer friend you were talking about?" Kiba practically pleaded to Nala.

"That's Sora alright!"

"Crap." Kiba cussed.

"But it's alright Sora doggie boy is with me!" Nala chirped.

"Okay." Sora shrugged and went back to her ramen; Kiba practically fainted on the spot.

"So what are you guys doing here anyways?" Kiba asked them.

"We got forehead protectors now pup, so were part of kondola." Sora pointed to the protector around her neck.

"Konoha." everyone including Ayame and her father corrected her.

"Whatever people." Sora dug into her food.

"Come on doggie boy lets go!" Nala grinned dragging Kiba away

"Poor pup." Sora shook her head.

"She better behave herself." Hikari frowned.

"So where do you guys want to go next?" Naruto asked.

"Introduce us to your friends, the more allies we make the better." Hikari suggested

"Then can we get more food I'm starving." Sora said as she removed a lollipop wrapper.

Hikari sighed as Naruto just stared at the beautiful yet intimidating girl with a huge appetite, he shrugged though and led them around.

First they met Naruto's team, Sakura, Sai and their sensei's Kakashi and Yamato.

"It's really nice to meet you two." Sakura smiled.

"The pleasure is all ours." Hikari smiled.

"Yo, isn't that make out paradise?" Sora was asking Kakashi.

"Uh…yes."

"Cool, I've already read that book though." she shrugged.

"You read these types of books?" Kakashi asked slowly.

"You mean the pervy, adult not for my age and very intimate type of books? Yeah."

"Interesting" Kakashi mused.

"Um sorry about Sora" Hikari smiled.

"Your smile…it looks like mine" Sai said looking at Hikari, "In my book it says that when people smile they tend to want to make friends, is that what you're trying to do?"

Sora looked at Sai curiously, twisting her lollipop around.

"Well of course, we want to make friends." Hikari answered.

"Are you Anbu Root?" Sora asked. Sai smiled and nodded his head.

"Oh that's why" Sora said, "Anyways come on Naruto you got some introducing to

do" Sora and Naruto had begun walking away.

"Well it was nice meeting you all, Kakashi-sensei, Yamato-sensei, Sakura, Sai" Hikari bowed her head as she jogged to keep up with Sora and Naruto

"Hey Shino! Hinata!" Naruto called to a girl and guy, who came up to them. The girl, Hinata was looking at Naruto and blushing slightly.

"Hey I'd like you to meet Sora and Hikari, they're new to Konoha."

"Hello, Hinata and Shino."

"It's nice to meet you, Hikari-chan and Sora-chan."

"Hello." Shino murmured.

"Next!" Sora called out.

"This is Guy's team." Naruto pointed out to Hikari and Sora.

"I am Konoha's handsome green beast, Rock Lee!" the guy in the green spandex held a thumb up.

"Tenten, nice to meet you."

"Hyuuga Neji." Neji muttered

"We're new to Konoha and Naruto is introducing us to his friends, it's really a pleasure meeting you all." Hikari smiled, "My name is Hikari and this is…"

"You the green thingy, let's fight." Sora said flicking her lollipop stick away, the stick landed neatly in a garbage can far away from them.

"…Sora" hikari sighed

"I Rock Lee accept your challenge fair maiden!"

"Fair maiden my ass lets see what you've got." Sora took a fighting stance unsheathing her two blades.

"Lee fights only in Taijutsu!" Naruto called out earning a whack from Tenten

"Really? Then I won't need these, instead…" Sora narrowed her eyes at Lee, putting her swords back; she reached into her weapons pouch and slowly began withdrawing her hand, her eyes glinting dangerously. Tension filled the area.

"What's she gonna do?" Naruto gulped. Lee also gulped loudly.

Sora stuck a lollipop in her mouth making everyone sweat drop, she then got into a Taijutsu stance and crooked two fingers at Lee, beckoning to him.

"What is that stance?" Tenten asked.

Lee went at Sora, starting off with a roundhouse kick. Sora lifted her hands up and Lee's foot connected with her hands, she didn't even flinch as she thrust him away, making him skid back. She went at Lee, kicking then punching him, landing a punch neatly in his gut. Lee came back, kicking her but again Sora deflected his attack pushing him away, she back flipped landing behind him as she and Lee begun a taijutsu off. Their moves so fast that the others could barely follow, even Neji had his byakugan activated to be able to keep up.

"Why doesn't she dodge?" he accidentally asked, nobody thought about it though as Hikari answered,

"She never dodges attacks; she thinks it is weak to dodge so instead she just keeps on going, regardless if she gets hurt. However, knowing Sora, she never gets hurt."

As Lee and Sora were still going at it, Tenten grimaced, "well I guess she's met her match Lee is awesome at taijutsu."

"It seems so, but Sora is just playing around with him, she hasn't even _begun _to fight."

Naruto and tenten gulped.

Sora bent down and kicked at Lee's shin twirling around to face his punches head on. In the midst of their punching and kicking, she threw away her lollipop stick making it land neatly into a bin. Once again, and she took out another lollipop, unwrapping it and throwing it in the air, she swirled around and landed a punch neatly against Lee's side. Then she jumped up and back flipped in the air, kicking Lee and catching the lollipop neatly in her mouth.

"Now that I got to warm up a bit, let's say we start this shall we?" Sora smirked.

Lee was breathing heavily and he looked beat up, whilst Sora looked spotless. It took but exactly 45 seconds to completely defeat Lee. Tenten and Naruto were gaping at Sora as she helped Lee up. Neji didn't dare to show his surprise

"You're really good, Rock Lee."

"Thank you Sora-chan, you are amazing." Lee laughed, limping towards the others.

"Now that you had your fun Sora, can we get going?" Hikari sighed.

"Yeah sure, see ya guys around."

Sora and Hikari began walking away.

"You coming Naruto?" Hikari called

"Yes." Naruto squeaked, he coughed though and said in a deeper voice "Yeah."

"So you have an affinity for air?" Kiba asked as he pressed his lips to Nala's, a soft breeze played around them as Nala kissed Kiba back.

"Yep." she murmured against his lips.

Kiba ran his tongue along her bottom lip and she parted them as their tongues entwined. Their kiss deepened and Kiba's hands were playing with the bandages on her stomach, going higher. They broke apart when the need for air was getting to be too much. They sat against a tree in each others arms.

"Do your friends know about us?" Kiba asked

"Hey, we just got together today and I haven't exactly gotten around to that yet!" Nala shifted around uncomfortably.

"Are you scared to tell them?" Kiba smirked.

"Well yeah, I mean Hikari's cool but when Sora finds out she'll castrate you then me. Tear us apart limb from limb, burn us alive and sell our ashes as a remedy for disease."

Kiba gulped "But…you're a girl how will she castrate you?"

"Trust me she'll find a way"

"Why would she do that anyways?"

"Because she's really protective over her friends and she's had a pretty rough relationship before so she's in that stage where all men are evil."

"Oh…Nala I don't want to be castrated." Kiba said weakly, Nala smiled and sat so that she was straddling his hips.

"I won't let her castrate you, besides I still need that part of your body for later."

Kiba grinned wolfishly as he brought her down for a long kiss.

One week later:

"You still haven't told them?" Kiba asked.

"Not exactly." Nala laughed nervously.

"Come on Nal, we can't keep meeting in secret!"

"Okay, okay I'll tell them today, or tomorrow, yeah tomorrow is good." Nala stood up. She kissed Kiba's lips.

"Love you." she called.

Kiba just waved, "I love you too Nala" he whispered quietly but the wind carried his voice to Nala anyways leaving her grinning like an idiot.

"Why are you so goddamn cheerful?" Sora grumbled at Nala, unwrapping a lollipop.

"Were getting closer to finding Talia and Konoha is awesome." Nala grinned

"Sure."

"Hikari is still in Tsunade's office?" Nala asked.

"Yeah, apparently they have a lead on Sasuke and Naruto just _has_ to come if Tsunade sends people out."

"Well of course Naruto is coming! The poor baby his story was so sad I thought I was gonna cry!" Nala sniffed.

Sora rolled her eyes, "he's 16 like us, and he's not exactly a 'poor baby'"

"Spoil sport." Nala crossed her arms. Hikari came up to them just then.

"Guess who's going on mission?"

"Us!" Nala jumped up and down.

"Finally. What happened?" Sora asked, twisting her lollipop around.

"Turns out Sasuke's formed a team called Hebi. They've been sighted around a prison and we're going to search for them or for any leads and report back here. Naruto, Sakura, Sai and Yamato-sensei are coming with us as well." Hikari explained.

"That Uchiha bastard, wait until I get my hands on him." Sora threatened.

"Come on you two we don't have much time we're supposed to meet everyone else at the gates." Hikari said.

The three leaped off towards Anko's house to pack their stuff then after saying goodbye to Anko they left to meet with team Kakashi.

"Wait!" Sora hollered out.

Everyone stopped in their tracks, ready to fight off the enemy. They were walking

through a small town.

"Sora! What's wrong?" Hikari asked looking around frantically.

"I ran out of lollipops I'll be back in a second." Sora said ducking into a nearby shop. Everyone sweat dropped.

"We really don't have time to be stopping." Yamato said.

"Sora! You scared us all to death!" Nala was yelling

"Sorry, but what was I supposed to do?" Sora asked innocently with armfuls of lollipops. She dumped them all into her pouch around her waist, "All good now let's get going."

She marched on ahead leaving everyone sweat dropping.

While everyone was tree-hopping Sakura decided to question these three beautiful yet mysterious girls.

"So how do you three know Sasuke?" she asked.

"He was with us when Orochimaru was alive. We used to spar and we were all of the same age group so we got along…sort of" Hikari said

Sakura raised a brow.

"You see Talia-our friend were looking for-she got along great with Sasuke. Hikari didn't bother so much. I was just teasing Talia and Sasuke and Sora was always threatening to murder or castrate Sasuke." Nala said brightly.

"Wait your friend…and Sasuke-kun…are they…" Sakura asked slowly.

"Kind of…I guess" Nala shrugged

Sakura went to her emo corner and Naruto, bless his adorable soul, went up to her grinning.

"So Sakura-chan does that mean you'll go out with me?"

"Naruto-baka!" Sakura roared punching Naruto. Naruto got up pouting and crossing his arms.

"Yo Sai, what was that nickname you gave Sakura?"

"You mean ugly bitch?" Sai smiled, also getting punched by Sakura.

Sora snickered quietly then looked at Naruto and Sai, the new owners of giant bruises, "Nicknames?"

"Yes in a book I read it mentioned that when you first meet someone you should give them a nickname to have a closer relationship, a name to do with the person's traits or personality."

"Oooh do you have nicknames for us?" Nala asked excitedly.

Sai nodded, he pointed at Nala "Hyper girl." Nala grinned.

"Sadistic lollipop lover." he pointed at Sora who shrugged.

"And Precious." he smiled at Hikari, who blinked back and looked at Sai.

"Why that nickname?" Sakura had to ask.

"Naruto is always talking about bonds and protecting his precious friends. Hikari looks like someone worth protecting." Sai smiled

"Aww that's so sweet." Nala put her hands together, Sora fake gagged.

"Thank you." Hikari whispered, her gaze still on Sai

Naruto was looking back and forth from Sai and Hikari, his eyes squinted, he then put his hands behind his head.

"Sooo, what's my nickname?" he asked loudly.

"Baka." everyone replied in unison, Naruto sweat dropped and fell on his face.

"But an adorable baka!" Nala grinned happily.

"Okay were here now I'll separate you into teams and we'll scout the area." Yamato explained, everyone nodded in agreement.

"Nala and Sakura will be with me. Sai and Hikari. Naruto and Sora."

"Hold on, Hikari and I are always a team." Sora said frowning at Sai

"Sora you are clearly strong and your affinity will help keep Naruto at bay. As we have discovered water and air have no affect." Yamato explained.

"Fine." Sora sighed.

"Okay now everyone stay safe, depart!" everyone fled and began running in different directions.

Sora and Naruto were running east and Sora made a sign with her hands, she closed her eyes for a minute.

"Sora?"

Sora's jade eyes opened and narrowed, she smirked.

"Found you Talia, come on Naruto!" she and Naruto began running forcing chakra to their feet.

"I sense her just up ahead!" Sora called out.

"Sasuke!" Talia cried.

Sasuke had just enough time to take out his sword and block the two swords the girl in front of him had tried to hit him with. The girl had monstrous strength and Sasuke grunted as he tried pushing her back. The girl grinned wickedly.

"You've gotten stronger, asshat."

"Sora, you are looking well." Sasuke grunted. Sora smirked and slashed her blades in an 'x' form making Sasuke skid back.

"Sora!" a girl with grey-white hair gasped.

"Come on Talia, lets go." sora said looking over her friend.

"No!" sora's eyes flashed to her face.

"Sasuke! I'm here to take you back!" came Naruto's loud voice as he appeared next to Sora.

"So you've teamed up with Konoha, eh Sora? Naruto I'm not coming back, I don't want to come back."

"I don't need a team to whip your sorry ass, Sasuke teme." Sora glared at him and then she looked at Talia, "Talia, you will come here right now."

"No Sora, I'm not coming with you."

Sora's eyes widened, "Talia? Friend, sister, earth? What's wrong with you?" Sora looked at Sasuke which answered her question. Rage filling her eyes, she went at him lighting speed punching him square in the face. Before she could hit him again a wall of earth blocked her.

"Talia?"

"No Sora I wont let you hurt him."

"Don't underestimate me, Talia; I will not hesitate to kill you both where you stand."

"I know, my friend." Talia nodded sadly as the wall of earth went down, a masked man appeared taking both Sasuke and Talia and disappearing into thin air.

"TALIA!" Sora roared sending huge waves of fire swirling around the spot the three disappeared.

"Sora?" Naruto asked. Sora turned the other way

"I'm fine" she snapped, "Let's go find the others" a breeze hit Sora's face and she looked up at the sky.

"Nala sent a message. They're returning to Konoha"

With that Naruto and Sora sped off.

I'm well aware that the order of the events that take place do not follow the correct order of the manga, but I've made a few…fine, fine…a lot of changes to suit my story. Hope you enjoyed it!


	4. Chapter 4

Chapter 3: Mission: Failure

Sai and Hikari had been fighting against the one called Juugo. Hikari was using her water element to carry the injured Sai back to Konoha. She still couldn't believe what had happened…

Hikari was injured pretty badly and so was Sai. Juugo had transformed thanks to his curse mark and he was now running at Hikari ready to kill. Hikari closed her eyes and braced herself for an attack, she knew she couldn't escape this, she could barely move an inch.

_Sorry you guys, Sora, Nala…Talia, I've failed you._

The sound of an impact echoed around and Hikari opened her eyes just to cringe back. Standing before her was Sai; Juugo had just slashed at him sending him into a tree. Sai sagged to the ground, his eyes closed.

"NO! SAI!" Hikari cried out, water rushed around her giving her new found strength. The water raged around Juugo, hurting him badly until he escaped and ran off badly injured.

Hikari limped over to Sai, falling to the ground. She put Sai's head in her lap, touching his face. There was a deep gash in his side, from which blood was flowing freely.

"Sai, why'd you save me?" she whispered.

Sai coughed, surprising Hikari, "b…because, y…your pr…pre…precious to m…me…hi…hikari."

Hikari's eyes widened and she felt her eyes sting. Sai cared about her, he really cared about her. Hikari had never had someone like that in her life, water smoothly wrapped itself around Sai's wound, and Hikari watched in astonishment as the water slowly healed Sai's deep wound.

"Thank you, water" she whispered, the water formed a sort of bed under Sai lifting him up and also healing hikari's wounds. Hikari looked at Sai, his face was peaceful now that the pain was gone; she slowly kissed his forehead and backed away wondering what on earth possessed her to do so. She shook her head and began tree hopping meeting up with Yamato, Sakura and Nala…

"How is he now?" Hikari asked Sakura who was healing Sai, Sakura sighed and

smiled at Hikari.

"He's doing okay, he's suffered some major injuries but it'll soon heal."

"Thank you." Hikari nodded. Sakura looked at Hikari strangely following her gaze which landed on Sai. Sakura smiled to herself and went over to Nala.

"Hey Yamato sensei, I sent a message to Sora, she and Naruto should be catching up to us any time now." Nala said.

"Good, we should get this girl back to konoha as soon as possible for questioning." Yamato-sensei nodded. He had used his wood element to cage their prisoner, one of Sasuke's followers, a girl named Karin.

"Do you think she'll be of any use to us?" Sakura wondered

"I think so after all she is with Hebi, so she probably knows a lot about the group and Sasuke." Yamato-sensei nodded

.

"Hey!" Naruto called out.

Everyone turned to see Naruto and Sora running behind them. They stopped to let them catch up and Sora and Naruto went into a thorough explanation about what they just went through.

"No way, not Talia!" Nala shook her head.

"It's true." Sora said frowning.

"She's not thinking straight, but we'll try again. Right now we have a lead or at least I hope so." Hikari grimaced looking at Karin.

"What about Sasuke-kun?" Sakura asked.

"He said he doesn't want to come home" Naruto said quietly looking at the ground.

"W…what?" Sakura's eyes widened.

The group made their way to Konoha where they immediately went to the Hokage's office when they got there they quickly explained everything to Tsunade.

"Right, well take this girl down to Ibiki for questioning." Tsunade put her head in her hands.

Sora smirked putting on her ninja gloves, "If you don't mind Hokage-sama, I'd like to do the questioning."

Sora looked pretty scary at that moment. Hikari and Nala exchanged worried glances.

"…Okay fine, just report back to me."

"Will do." Sora waved as she left the room.

"Please tell me I did the right thing?" Tsunade asked wearily.

"Well Sora is pretty experienced in torturing and intense questioning." Nala said nervously. Suddenly a girl's scream echoed throughout the tower. Everyone jumped in fright.

"You'll get your answers to any question, not in very pleasant ways but still Sora will make sure to bring us answers." Hikari said.

Another scream…Everyone exchanged glances and ran out of the room to the torture chamber as fast as they could.

Sora was grinning sadistically as she took off her blood covered gloves. Tsunade and everyone else peered into the room to find Ibiki and his crew frightened to hell.

"So what would you like to know?" Sora asked calmly, everyone cringed, but Tsunade soon calmed down and said, "Everything."

Sora told her friends and the Hokage everything Karin's mind contained.

"Is…is she still alive?" Sakura asked.

"Kinda." Sora shrugged, everyone gulped.

Meanwhile Guy's team was training out in a field when Neji approached Lee.

"Lee you know the moon dipped hair girl you were fighting before?" he asked cautiously making it sound as though it were a bother to even talk about this.

"Moon dipped…? Oh you mean Sora-chan. Ah yes, we are always sparring, she is very strong and youthful!" Lee grinned

"But don't you notice something strange about her?" Neji asked

"Not at all, my fabulous rival. She is just a strong, determined, beautiful, young lady." Lee frowned.

"When do you guys usually spar?" Neji asked casually.

"Well she should be meeting me in an hour or so."

"Do you mind if I stay and watch?" Neji asked, "I mean, it really does seem as though she is hiding something and it is our job to protect Konoha from any threats." he quickly said.

"Of course!" Lee smiled brightly.

Sora was on her way to meet Lee, when Lee and Neji came up to her. That second some ninja were taking Karin away to the hospital.

"Ahhh! It's her! Please kill me now! I beg you!" Karin was screaming at the ninja. Sora smirked.

"Um…she seems to be very frightened of you." Neji said, wide eyes looking at Karin.

"I have that affect on people, now come on lee, let's fight." Sora said

She and Lee made their way to a training field where they got ready to fight. Neji watched them a short distance away.

Hikari was walking to Anko's house on her way back from Tsunade's office. Sora had gone to spar with Rock Lee and Nala went off to…god knows where that girl went off to.

Hikari eyed the hospital wearily and with a sigh she changed her course heading straight into the hospital to the receptionist.

"Um…sai? Please?" she asked unsurely, the receptionist looked at her clipboard and nodded.

"Room 203."

"Thank you" Hikari nodded.

She then went down the hall looking at the room numbers until she reached 203. She opened the door slowly and found Sai lying on a bed, sleeping. Hikari went in quietly and looked down at Sai, smiling slightly, she turned to the empty vase on his bed side, and summoned her water element. Slowly flowers began forming in the vase, white water lilies.

"I hope you feel better sai." she said, "I didn't even get a chance to really thank you for what you did. It was really brave of you and I'm sorry you had to suffer because of me." she stood silent for a while.

"I don't even know what I'm doing anymore. Talia wont come back to us, I can't help my teammates anymore and right know I'm confused to why I'm even here…You said that I was worth protecting, but why me? I don't think I'm worth it, when I can't even protect those I care about." hikari gasped quietly when she realized what she had said, then she looked at the ground, "There I go again, babbling, it's a good thing your not awake otherwise I would be really embarrassed now…I guess I'll just stop talking then."

A hand reached for hers, "No, I like hearing you talk." came Sai's voice

"Sai?" Hikari gasped. Sai was looking at her with his coal black eyes. Hikari felt like she was burning, her face felt hot.

Sai smiled, a real smile not his usual fake ones but one that came from deep down in his heart, "I care about you too, Hikari."

"That was an excellent fight, Sora-chan." Lee huffed, wheezing for air. Sora was unfazed breathing normally.

"Yeah, you're getting better. Soon I might even have to take off my weights." Sora nodded, putting a lollipop in her mouth.

"You are wearing weights?" Lee sagged to the ground, "And your still faster and stronger then me."

"Sorry, Lee." Sora smiled.

"No this is good I shall become stronger then eventually I will be able to beat my rival!" Lee said looking all lively with tears streaming down his face and his fist clenched before him.

"Really? Who's your rival? He must be pretty strong." Sora smirked, wondering if she'll ever get a chance to fight this rival.

"Oh yes, Sora-chan he is probably the strongest of our age group and yours. Hyuuga Neji."

"Wait that guy?" Sora nodded towards Neji, Lee nodded his head.

"Hey Hyuuga!" Sora called. Neji appeared by their side, "Fight me" Sora grinned.

Neji shook his head, "I do not fight with girls."

"You don't fight with…? To hell with you, fight me!" Sora frowned crossing her arms.

"You fight with Tenten." Lee pointed out.

"That's different." Neji shrugged.

"Oh." Sora smirked, "I see why he fights with _Tenten_ only."

Neji paled, "Tenten and I are strictly teammates, I harbor no feelings for her whatsoever."

Everyone watched Tenten go to her emo corner. Neji sweat dropped.

"Come on Hyuuga; are you scared that I'll beat you?"

"Childish taunts like that do not faze me." Neji crossed his arms, Sora glared at him.

"Fuck you then, we'll fight the hard way." she punched Neji, only to be blocked swiftly. She then kicked him, and when Neji blocked, her foot connected and sent him flying back. Neji landed on his feet neatly.

"What was that about not fighting girls?" Sora smirked.

"I guess I can make an exception." Neji grunted as he went at Sora, trying to catch her in his trigram technique, but she would just hit his palms away.

"Why don't you just dodge?" Neji gritted his teeth, making his attacks soften in fear of hurting her.

"I. Am. Not. A. Coward." Sora stressed out each word.

"Are you saying that I am?" Neji glared at her, as he dodged one of her fists.

"Out loud? No."

Neji snapped and came at her with full strength.

"Yes, Hyuuga, now that's much more entertaining." Sora grinned. A ball of fire formed in the air, teaming up with Sora in a way and attacking neji. The fire didn't burn him; it just hurt him as much as a punch would…A chakra enforced punch. Neji and Sora were battling with such speed and strength that Lee could barely follow their movements. The ground shook with their every impact. The training area was then filled with a light smoke.

Finally the smoke began to clear revealing Sora pinned to a tree by a smirking Neji, his body leaning into hers.

"I don't see you acting so tough now." Neji said. Sora's up close face was glaring at him and then she looked up, smiled, winked at Neji and turned into flames. Neji backed away from the tree.

"Gotcha." two swords were placed in an 'x' form at his neck.

"How did you get past my Byakugan?" Neji breathed.

"You will never know." Sora's voice was at his ear, her warm breath tickling his skin. In another second she was gone, leaving a bewildered Neji and a lost Lee.

"Wait…did you…lose?" Lee asked slowly as though the words were foreign. Neji sighed in frustration, punching a nearby tree.

Sora was smiling smugly as she made her way to Anko's place. The place was empty and Sora decided to take shower. When she went into Anko's room, the sight before her made her gasp and drop her lollipop, which she had just stuck in her mouth.

"What the fucking hell is going on here!" she cussed.

Nala and Kiba quickly broke away from their intense kiss. The two blushed furiously.

"Ah, Sora…um well you know kiba…and I…um…well he kinda…came over…and

I…" Nala was stuttering.

"Hell yeah I know this mutt, but what the fuck is he doing sticking his tongue down your throat?" Sora asked reaching for her blades.

"Listen Sora…Nala and I…"

"Shut the fuck up mutt." Sora snapped cutting Kiba off. Nala hurried in front of Kiba.

"Please, Sora don't castrate him, it's not his fault…I…"

"Nala." Sora said in a warning tone.

"Please, just listen to me?" Nala pleaded.

"You have ten seconds starting now." Sora growled, her glare never leaving Kiba.

"Sora, I really, really like Kiba okay and he likes me too. I know that you hate guys and you want to protect us but you have to let us make our own mistakes, please Sora." Nala said quickly

"You, mutt." Sora brought out her sword pointing it at Kiba, Kiba stood up, "If I hear that you've hurt Nala in any way, you'll find yourself a dead man. I will enjoy tearing you limb from limb and feeding you to the wolves." Kiba nodded too scared to say anything.

"Nala, are you sure about this guy, he looks like some weakling that can hardly defend himself."

"I'm a hundred percent sure about Kiba." Nala said brightly.

"Whatever, now don't go around blinding me with your kissing." Sora muttered taking her stuff and leaving the room.

"Well that went great, don't you think, Kiba?" Nala turned to her boyfriend, Kiba had fainted.

Hikari had spent her entire day in the hospital, talking with Sai and getting to know him. For an anbu that went through intense training to forget his emotions, they sure were coming back quickly and Hikari found herself smiling and laughing along with Sai.

After the incident with Sora. She had taught them all that guys were bad that they should have nothing to do with them. Hikari wondered how Sora would react if she found her talking with Sai like this.

"Well I have to go now Sai, my friends will wonder where I am."

"Will you come tomorrow?"

"Yeah, sure." Hikari nodded as she left Sai's hospital room.

Sai turned in his bed to touch the water lilies Hikari had left him. A small smile touched his lips as he fingered the soft petals.

Sora was sitting at ichiraku ramen during the evening, eating bowl after bowl and ordering more.

"You okay Sora?" Naruto asked.

"Yeah, just perfect Naruto." Sora sighed.

"You don't seem so perfect." Naruto frowned.

"Just remembering the good old times." Sora grimaced.

"Oh, I'm guessing they aren't that good."

"You know for an idiot, you're not that dim."

Naruto laughed, "Wanna order another bowl, Sora? On me."

"Thanks Naruto but I gotta go. I have to meet with this woman who's selling her house. My friends and I can't stay with Anko nee-san forever." sora sighed and got up.

"Right, see you tomorrow then sora-chan."

Sora waved at naruto as she walked away.

"I'll take it." sora nodded, handing the woman a stack of money and the woman handed her the keys.

Sora smiled at the house before her and nodded once, walking off towards anko's place.

On the way she sensed that she was being followed and she smirked before darting into a dark alley. Her follower came in right after her. Sora whirled around with spectacular speed and held her blades to the person's throat.

"Okay you got me."

"Hyuuga? What the fuck? You asshole!" sora said releasing him.

"Do you usually greet people so crudely?" neji frowned rubbing his neck.

"What do you want?"

"Rematch."

Sora smirked "when and where, bastard?"

The next morning, sora dragged hikari and nala with her to the house she had bought keeping it a surprise from them.

"Ta-da." she said, opening her arms towards the house.

"Yeah it's a nice house Sora." Hikari said slowly not understanding what the big deal was.

"Uh-huh, who lives here?" Nala asked.

"From today onwards, we do! I bought this place yesterday." Sora explained.

"Really, our own house!" Nala jumped up in excitement.

"This is awesome Sora." Hikari smiled.

"Here you are my friends, you each have your own key." Sora handed them each a key, putting one in her pocket and holding out another, "And this one is for Talia when she comes back." everything was silent for a while until Sora broke it.

"Well come on, you're gonna love this place. It has a living room, kitchen, four bedrooms each with its own giant bathroom, a dining room and a sitting room." Sora went on as the three girls went into the house.

"Yay! When can we start moving in?" Nala asked.

"We can get some of our friends to help us with getting the furniture." Hikari suggested.

"We can start today." Sora smiled.

The entire day the girls worked hard to fix up their house, they bought new furniture and got their friends to help out. Naruto came bright and early and Kiba came over right after. Lee also came in as a favor for Sora.

Together the friends set up all the furniture and were laughing and over all having a great time.

Near the middle Kiba took off his jacket, making Nala drop her side of the couch to ogle at her boyfriend.

"Yo mutt, put your jacket back on before Nala kills some body!" Sora said glaring at Nala.

Once downstairs had finished, they worked on the bedrooms upstairs.

"I'm sparring with Neji today." Sora told Lee as he helped her out with the desk.

"Really? That's nice to hear. Neji needs to let loose and interact with women." Lee nodded.

"Eww lee! Holy hell, Neji? Are you serious?" Nora snorted, "I just like beating him, he's too obnoxious for his own good."

"He's a good guy."

"Please, and since your so keen on match-making how about you and Sakura, huh?" Sora smirked watching Lee's face redden.

"Sora!" Nala interrupted just then.

"Yeah Nal?"

"Hikari and I were thinking of throwing a sort of small party in honor of our new house, what do you say?"

"Well I won't be joining the party so sounds like a good idea." Sora shrugged.

"Yay!" Nala backed up then "Oh you're joining the party alright."

Sora rolled her eyes then looked at Lee, "Well thanks for helping out Lee, your coming to the party right? I'll make sure that Sakura will be here" Sora grinned.

"Yosh! I will definitely come! Do you mind if I bring Tenten and Neji as well?"

"Not at all." Sora said as Lee left. Sora turned to her room with an evil grin, she couldn't wait to start decorating, but she knew she wouldn't be able to spar with Neji today. Oh well, not like she was looking forward to seeing the bastard.

Neji waited at the training grounds, tapping his foot impatiently. A ball of fire appeared before him and he skidded back thinking that it was Sora that had come to attack him, instead the fire began separating and forming words in the air.

_Sorry asshole, I'm busy._

Neji sighed at the note, this girl sure loved to be crude.

"Neji-kun, Sora and her friends are having a party at their new house tonight, it will be very youthful. Do you want to come?" Lee called.

After a long and tiring afternoon, Sora, Nala, Hikari, Naruto and Kiba sat at the dining table discussing the party.

"Guess we have to move the couches out of the way, huh?" Nala asked.

"Yeah and we need to buy food." Naruto said.

"Okay how about this. Naruto will get the decorations. Nala and Kiba, food. Hikari will get junk food and I'll rearrange stuff." Sora suggested everyone nodded and left quickly.

Hikari quickly bought the junk food and she hurriedly escaped to the hospital into Sai's room. Sai was sitting up in his bed and he smiled when Hikari came.

"Finally." he said.

"I'm sorry Sai, my friends and I bought a new house and we spent all day moving in."

"It's alright Hikari you're here now."

"Yeah but I cant stay long, the girls are expecting me." Hikari said holding up her shopping bags. Sai slowly slid off his bed walking towards Hikari.

"I don't think you should be getting up so soon." Hikari said.

"I would like to try something, I don't know if I'm doing this right." Sai frowned. He took Hikari's chin between his fingers gently, lifting her face to him.

"Sai…"

"tell me if I'm doing this wrong." Sai pressed his lips tenderly to Hikari's. He kissed her lips so gently, it seemed as though he were just brushing lightly against her lips. Hikari gasped suddenly and ran out of the room, she ran all the way home.

"I'm back, with all the junk food!" she said, her voice was all wrong, too jumpy.

"What did you eat some on the way?" Sora grumbled.

Hikari looked around the place it looked pretty good, with all the decorations and the couches had been moved expertly.

"You did this by yourself." Hikari said.

"That's how I roll, miracle how things can happen with some chakra, and the element of fire on your side." Sora said.

"Uh-oh someone's in her sarcastic mood." Nala giggled.

"Oh piss off."

Slowly their guests began to arrive, first up was Choji and Ino. Ino had brought flowers for them for which Hikari thanked her graciously.

Then came Shino, Hinata and Kiba. Kiba immediately went to Nala and Hinata went over to chat with Hikari.

Naruto came in as loud as ever and everyone else arrived as well.

Hikari was being an amazing host mingling and thanking everyone for coming

Nala was with Kiba and Sora was in the kitchen sitting at the counter alone, a frown on her face. She was unwrapping yet another lollipop.

"Shouldn't you get sugar high with all those lollipops you have a day?"

"Hyuuga asshole, to what do I owe this pleasure."

"This is your party shouldn't you be the least be courteous?" Neji smirked.

"Oh just fuck off and leave me alone, I'll pulverize you some other day." Sora grumbled.

Neji sighed and sat across from Sora, "I have been taught to be a gentleman, no matter how crude the young lady may be…what's the matter?"

"None of your fucking business, Hyuuga just go away!" Sora snapped as she left the kitchen with ninja speed.

"What did I do wrong?" Neji asked blinking back.

"Dude, it's not your fault." Kiba said coming into the kitchen to grab something out of the fridge.

"Oh yeah, who's is it then?"

"Hell if I knew, Nala says that today is like an anniversary type thing for Sora."

"Anniversary?"

"Some sort of bad relationship, that's all I know and if Sora finds out we know…she'll *gulp* castrate us."

Neji knew not to take Sora's threats lightly.

"She's thinking about him again, isn't she?" Hikari sighed.

"I thought this party might help her cheer up." Nala frowned.

"Well clearly it hasn't." Hikari nodded towards the stairs where a sad Sora was coming down. She walked towards the girls ignoring the intense making out Lee and Sakura were doing and the tender kissing of a certain Uzumaki and Hyuuga Hinata.

"Wow, she hasn't even threatened to kill somebody yet." Nala mused.

"Hey Hikari, Nala I'm gonna sleep now. I'll help clean up later if you want." Sora said to them.

"No it's alright Sora, you just sleep and get some rest." Nala said quickly.

"Yeah don't worry about a thing." Hikari said

Sora's intense jade eyes flashed towards her friends, "I don't need your pity." she hissed, and then she turned to go back upstairs.

"We have to fix this somehow." Hikari said.

"Definitely…where's my Kiba?" Nala went off in search of her boyfriend while Hikari just shook her head at her friend.

The party went on till midnight, until slowly everyone began leaving. They thanked Nala and Hikari for a good time and in the end only Kiba stayed though he went with Nala to her room.

"You better not let Sora catch you two." Hikari warned.

"We know!" Nala winked at her.

Hikari went to her room then as well. She finally had a chance to think about earlier that day in the hospital. What exactly did that kiss mean? Hikari touched her lips closing her eyes.

Hikari thought about Sora and the state she was in now. Her personality had changed and she had become crueler, was that what a guy does to a girl? Or maybe Sora had just been with the wrong guy?

Hikari then thought about Nala and Kiba, it made her smile. Those two were a cute couple and they seemed to love each other so much, was it so _wrong_ to be happy?


	5. Chapter 5

**Chapter 4**

**The next day Sora wasn't in a better mood. It's not like she loved being like this, it's that she had no choice. There are some things you just can't run away from and you can't completely forget them. She trudged along the path that led to the training grounds; she noticed someone was already there.**

"**Come on Hyuuga, I owe you a good beating from yesterday." she scowled at him.**

**Neji turned to look at Sora, he smirked, "I guess someone's not in a very good mood."**

"**Shut up and fight, asshat."**

"**Since you asked so nicely." Neji mocked.**

**Sora came at him and Neji immediately activated his Byakugan. He easily dodged one of her punches, to almost be punched by her other fist.**

"**Stop dodging and take it like a man." Sora frowned, kicking him in midair.**

"**Do you want me to get bruised?" Neji asked raising a brow in amusement.**

"**Was that a trick question?" **

"**Ouch." Neji rolled his eyes.**

"**Fuck you, use your palm thingy already and hit me!" Sora growled.**

"**It's not called a 'palm thingy' and what are you now? A masochist?"**

"**I hate you." Sora hissed, aiming yet another punch at neji and this time her fist was enclosed in a swirl of fire. Neji's eyes widened and on pure reflex he hit his palm against Sora's stomach. Sora clutched her stomach and coughed up blood.**

"**Uh…sorry about that I…"**

**Sora smirked, "_The_ Hyuuga Neji apologizing? This must be my lucky day." she coughed up more blood and this time she laughed cruelly.**

"**Now this…this is more like it." she unsheathed her swords and ran at Neji.**

"**Shit." Neji gulped.**

**Hikari walked along the Konoha path heading towards the Hokage's tower.**

"**Hello Hikari." a person landed next to her softly on the ground.**

"**S…Sai, um…hi!" Hikari laughed nervously.**

"**Are you okay? Your face is all red." Sai asked, reaching to touch Hikari's cheek. Hikari backed away at the touch.**

"**Of course! You…um…They let you out of the hospital?"**

"**Yes." Sai smiled.**

**The two reached the Hokage building.**

"**Well um…I have to talk with Tsunade-sama, so I'll…um…see you around."**

**Sai quickly kissed her cheek and gave her a scroll, before Hikari could react Sai had vanished.**

"**What the hell am I doing?" Hikari wondered aloud. She looked at the scroll in her hands she tucked it away and headed into Tsunade's office.**

"**Hikari, good, you know Kakashi?" Tsunade said gesturing towards the white haired man.**

**Hikari bowed to Kakashi, "Hai."**

**Hikari was always being called to Tsunade's office seeing as though she was the clear leader of the girls. She was 17 while Sora and Nala were sixteen and Sora and Nala declared her as leader.**

"**Well thanks to Sora's…questioning, we have another lead on Sasuke's whereabouts. So your team, along with Kakashi, Guy and Kurenai's team will take on this mission." Tsunade continued to explain.**

"**Sakura-san, what is love?"**

**Sakura gaped at Sai but quickly composed herself.**

"**Haven't you read anything about it, Sai?"**

"**I have, a lot. But I still don't understand." Sai frowned.**

"**Well love is complicated that way, but I guess it's a strong emotion you feel to a special someone, when you care about them."**

"**How do you know when your in love?" Sai asked.**

"**I suppose you feel happier especially around that person. Your stomach gets butterflies and your heart starts to beat faster. You want to be with no one else except Lee…I mean your loved one!" Sakura blushed furiously.**

**Sai nodded as though he'd just heard the most heart filling explanation ever.**

"**I think I understand now, thank you Sakura-san." Sai left then. Sakura sagged against the wall letting out a deep breath.**

"**Oh yay! We get to go on another mission and this time Kibbles gets to come!" Nala threw her hands into the air.**

"**Kibbles?" Sora snorted.**

"**Anyways we have to get ready now, and it looks as though the weather is getting colder." Hikari said.**

**The girls quickly got changed and packed their things, then putting on a beige and red sort of cloak.**

"**Shouldn't you dress more warmly?" Nala frowned looking over Sora's outfit underneath the cloak. A round the waist skirt reaching just above her knees, a tucked in netted shirt and a small v-neck tank.**

"**Funny thing about fire." Sora smirked making a small ball of fire in her palm, "it just _radiates_ heat."**

"**Smartass." Nala stuck her tongue out childishly.**

"**Come on you two lets get going." Hikari told them. The girls nodded and jumped from where they stood outside.**

"**Is everyone ready?" Kakashi asked.**

"**Hai!"**

"**Right, in order to find Sasuke…" Sora coughed at this moment, Kakashi sighed, "And Talia." Sora nodded, "I'm going to put you in groups and you'll each have one of my nin-hounds with you."**

**The teams were Naruto, Hinata, Yamato sensei and Shino. Then Kakashi, Hikari and Sai. Sora, Neji and Lee. Sakura, Kiba, Nala and Tenten.**

"**Why are the teams set up like this?" Naruto asked.**

**Kakashi sighed once more, "Naruto if we run into the Akatsuki they will probably be after you that's why I've put three others with you including Hinata's Byakugan which will be useful and Yamato will be there to keep the Kyuubi at bay if there is any fighting involved. In my team I can easily search the area with my nin-hounds and Sai will be able to search from the sky. I've placed Neji and Lee with Sora, since she's reckless and will need strong teammates to hold her back from murdering anyone. And since Sakura is our strongest med nin there are three others on her team."**

"**I'm not reckless." Sora frowned.**

"**Aaaaanyways lets go!" Kakashi said, everyone immediately left their meeting sight.**

"**Kakashi's nin-hounds are cute and all, but I have something which will lead us to Talia easier." Sora smirked. She, Lee and Neji were tree hopping through the forest along with a small nin-hound.**

**Sora put her hands together in the form of a sign, closing her eyes. Neji's byakugan was activated and he glanced at Sora noticing that her chakra was seeping in one direction.**

"**North-east." he and Sora said simultaneously.**

**Sora glared at Neji, who just smirked.**

"**Is that where your friend is?" Lee asked, immune to the death glares Sora and Neji were giving to each other.**

"**Yes." Sora answered.**

"**How would you know?"**

"**Well the thing is, in our group it's almost like were paired up, water and air, fire and earth. I can sense Talia anywhere since my element is closest to hers. I can pinpoint the exact location, whereas if I were looking for Nala or Hikari I can only sense the area they'd be in."**

**Lee nodded in understanding, "Then let's go and save your friend!"**

**Sora smiled and everyone picked up their pace.**

"**Sai I want you to search from the skies and take hikari with you. Hikari you might be able to sense Talia nearby." Kakashi instructed, the two teens nodded and Sai took out a scroll drawing quickly. He made a sign and instantly a large bird formed from the paper. Sai got on the bird and held out his hand to Hikari. Hikari smiled slightly and took his hand as he helped her up, the bird took flight and Hikari quickly wrapped her arms around Sai's waist, the bird continued soaring through the sky.**

"**I know this probably isn't the best time for this, but I'm guessing you haven't opened the scroll I gave you?" Sai asked his eyes searching the forest below.**

"**I'm so sorry everythings been so chaotic I haven't had the chance." Hikari took out the scroll from her pouch, "Is it okay if I open it now?"**

"**Of course." Sai smiled.**

**Hikari slowly opened the scroll. Her eyes widened and she let out a quiet gasp, it was a drawn picture of a girl surrounded by swirls of water, underneath the picture was written 'precious'**

"**It's beautiful." Hikari breathed**

"**That's because its you." Sai smiled.**

"**It is?" Hikari looked at the girl. She was no doubt pretty and now that hikari looked at it again it did look like her.**

"**That's how I look at you, beautiful, powerful and kind-hearted."**

**Hikari turned her gaze to Sai's coal eyes which were now looking into hers. She wrapped her arms around his neck and pulled him towards her. Sai put his hands on her hips and tilted his head as their lips met; this time it wasn't just sai kissing it was Hikari as well. Hikari noticed how Sai's full lips were kissing her, so gently just like before except there was a certain spark to it this time.**

"**Sora!" Hikari gasped, breaking away from Sai.**

"**What's wrong did something happen to her?" Sai asked, putting a hand to her cheek.**

"**I'm not sure I just sensed her element get stronger…she does that when she's about to do something reckless…damn!"**

"**Where is she now?" Sai asked.**

"**Talia." Sora said then she glanced at the person next to her friend who was grinning widely.**

"**And Kisame, what a pleasant surprise."**

"**Aw Sora, I missed you too." Kisame grinned even wider.**

"**Sora, you shouldn't have come here." Talia said her eyes sad.**

"**Like fuck I shouldn't, you're coming back with us Talia!" Sora snapped, "And what the fuck is going on, why are you two guarding this place."**

"**Oh you didn't hear? The battle of the Uchiha brothers is going on." Kisame said.**

**Sora's eyes widened and she let out a hiss, "You will let me pass!"**

"**Sorry sweet heart no can do." Kisame shook his head**

"**Sora what's going on here, how do you know this Akatsuki member?" Lee asked**

**Sora ignored Lee.**

"**Talia?"**

"**I'm so sorry Sora, but I can't let you pass, Sasuke-kun and Ita…" **

"**To hell with Sasuke! If you aren't going to let me pass, I'll just have to fight you." Sora said her expression pure rage. She ran at Kisame with her blades and a wall of earth blocked her way, hitting Sora.**

"**Sora-chan!" Lee cried out, but Sora turned into flames. Talia whirled around to see the real Sora running full speed towards the fight.**

"**Neji, Lee!" Hikari cried out as she and Sai came running towards them.**

"**Talia get Sora, I'll fight these people off." Kisame said taking out his giant sword.**

**Talia nodded and turned to run after Sora, but Hikari stood in front of her.**

"**Long time no see…Talia."**

**Hikari turned to look at Neji.**

"**Go after her." Neji nodded and he went after Sora.**

"**Itachi." Sora said the Uchiha brothers turned to look at Sora; both were bloodied up and hurt.**

**Itachi turned to Sasuke, "I'll be back sasuke."**

**Itachi reappeared next to Sora, he looked at her frowning. His lip was bleeding and so were his eyes, he could barely stand.**

**Sora broke through her mask she had been wearing all along, her face twisted into pure sadness as she threw herself at Itachi hugging him.**

"**Itachi." she murmured.**

"**My beautiful Sora." he wrapped his arms around her.**

**Neji had appeared to see Sora and Itachi hugging each other. What the fucking hell! His mind was screaming.**

"**Itachi!" Sasuke roared.**

**Sora had broken away from Itachi to look at Sasuke, and then she looked at Neji.**

"**Please Neji, give me just two minutes."**

**Neji nodded and ran at Sasuke, Sasuke blocked his attack quickly.**

"**Uchiha Sasuke."**

"**Hyuuga this isn't your fight." Sasuke snapped at him. Neji was thinking the same thing, but Sora had asked him to give her some time. Why was he agreeing to this? Hell knew, but Sora…she looked so different…Neji couldn't explain it but it was as though he had met a whole new Sora.**

**Itachi caressed Sora's cheek, as she tilted her head into his palm.**

"**My sweet Sora, I'm so sorry, I just hope you can forgive me."**

"**Of course Itachi, I forgive you, but you don't have to sacrifice yourself, we can leave now, come with me…stay here with me." Sora almost pleaded, Itachi wrapped his arms around her.**

"**You know I can't do that Sora, my time is up now."**

**Sora looked at him her jade eyes wide, "but I love you."**

"**I don't deserve your love, not after everything I've done to you, but remember Sora that I've always loved you no matter what has happened between us. There hasn't been a single day or minute that I haven't thought of you and regretted what I had done."**

**Itachi pulled her face to his kissing her tenderly on the lips.**

"**This is goodbye then?" Sora asked.**

"**Yes."**

**Sora wrapped her arms around Itachi engaging in a passionate and fierce kiss. After a whole minute, Itachi broke away.**

"**I love you Sora."**

**Sora let Itachi go. She watched him as he took Neji's place in battling Sasuke, and Neji came over to her, bruised all over and breathing heavily. The battle ended right before their eyes. Itachi pressing his fingers to Sasuke's forehead and both Uchiha brothers fell to the ground, before Neji and Sora could rush towards them; the masked man appeared and vanished in a second taking with him the two brothers.**

"**No, Itachi." Sora fell to the ground, staring at the spot Itachi had been lying on. Just as Neji was going to say something, Sora got up, flames flicking all around in her in rapid movements.**

"**Sora?" **

**Sora let out a frustrated growl, as she destroyed everything around her with her fire. She punched and kicked the remaining boulders and walls, leaving a mess out of what was already a mess. Neji watched in silence as Sora let out all her anger and emotions. His byakugan noticed that she was rapidly losing her chakra; he went up to her as she kicked another boulder breaking it to pieces.**

"**Sora, you've exhausted your chakra enough." he said, Sora turned on him throwing a punch. Neji caught her fist in his hand and brought it down as he looked at sora's face, it was full of despair, one emotion neji had never seen on her face. In fact the only emotions on her face were anything but sadness. Sora seemed to notice how Neji was looking at her.**

"**I don't need anyone's pity! I don't need anyone!" she snapped, she put her hands together forming speedy hand signs.**

"**Fire element: eruption of fire!" she cried out. Neji backed away as raging winds of fire licked around her; they grew bigger reaching high into the sky and spreading across the area.**

"**Holy shit Sora!" Hikari had come along with Lee and Sai.**

"**Did you guys win your battle?" Neji asked.**

"**No they ran away." Lee shook his head.**

"**And the others?"**

"**On their way." Sai answered, he was looking at Hikari who was watching Sora with worry.**

"**We have to stop her, she'll hurt herself."**

"**But why is she doing this? Because of Talia?" Lee was wondering.**

**Neji and Hikari were quiet.**

"**It doesn't matter why, but right now she's exhausting too much of her chakra." Neji said quickly.**

"**She's what?" Hikari turned to Neji.**

"**She's exhausting her chakra." Neji repeated.**

"**Damn it Sora!" Hikari cussed.**

"**What is it?" Neji asked.**

"**She's doing this on purpose she _wants_ to exhaust her chakra…she wants to get hurt."**

"**I don't understand." Lee frowned.**

"**Our elements come to us naturally. We usually have no need for our chakra, its almost like a back up, because even if we were to use our chakra, our elements are far stronger and our chakra seems like nothing. Sora is using her chakra now instead of just summoning fire, she wants to get hurt." Hikari explained.**

**Neji grimaced, what was wrong with Sora? So apparently her ex-boyfriend died, but since when did _Sora_ get so emotional?**

"**So what do we do now?" Sai asked.**

"**We have to talk some sense into her." Hikari said.**

"**I don't think anyone can get close enough." Lee said wearily looking at all the surrounding flames.**

"**We just have to try then." Neji braced himself to run.**

"**No, Neji wait." Hikari held out a hand.**

"**There isn't any time to wait!" Neji growled lowly.**

"**I know, but what your about to do is suicide. I'll surround you with my water element then you can go through the flames and to Sora." **

**Neji nodded grimly and Hikari made a sign. Water swirled around Neji making a ball form around him.**

"**Quick!" Hikari told him. Neji ran through the flames easily, towards Sora.**

"**Sora!" he roared over the flames. He covered his face with his arms as he came closer to her.**

"**Sora that's enough already! You're going to hurt yourself!"**

"**I don't care." Sora shook her head. Her jade eyes were now a deep shade of red, and flames were emitting everywhere around her. Her cloak had burnt because of the fire and was now lying on the ground.**

"**But everyone else does! Hikari is really worried."**

**Sora shook her head as the flames grew more and more.**

"**Why are you doing this?" Neji asked.**

"**Why should it matter to you, just leave me alone!"**

**Neji took a risk hoping that his life would be spared after this, "Is Itachi really worth all this? It sounded like he did some pretty horrid things to you."**

"**Shut up! Don't say his name!" Sora snapped.**

**Neji couldn't pass up the opportunity to taunt her, "What's going to happen, huh? Will you kill me for saying the name _Itachi_?"**

**Sora shrieked at him "I _will_ kill you!"**

"**I'm sure you would, but you'd be too busy being dead and all from this." Neji gestured towards the fire.**

"**I won't die…" Sora muttered.**

"**On the contrary, you probably will, just like Itachi" neji added with a foolish grin, **

"**So he was your boyfriend? Wow…What did you see in him anyways?" Neji was asking sarcastically.**

**You could almost see the steam coming from Sora.**

"**The flames are dying out, Neji must be talking some sense into her." Hikari smiled in Sai's arms**

"**Yosh! That is my rival!" Lee jumped up.**

"**The flames are disappearing quickly." Sai noted, and it was true. The intense flames were quickly being reduced to nothing but a small puff of smoke, and out from all this smoke came a running Hyuuga Neji and after him was a pissed off Sora.**

**Neji came running towards the group with a smirk on his face, Hikari shook her head at him.**

"**You were supposed to make her feel better, not tease her and piss her off."**

"**I know but _I_ feel better." Neji shrugged. Sora then stalked up to them giving her worst murder glare to Neji, who just gave her sly smile, Sora's wide eyes drooped a bit.**

"**Hikari where's Talia…" Sora fainted from chakra exhaustion. Neji sighed and lifted her up into his arms.**

"**I told her she'd get hurt."**

**Hikari smiled, "Aren't you the dedicated team mate."**

**Neji frowned and practically tossed Sora over to Lee. Lee caught her bridal style and looked at her.**

"**She looks peaceful doesn't she?"**

"**Yeah, and underneath that peacefulness is someone who's going to try to murder me soon." Neji rolled his eyes. He took off his beige cloak and draped it over sora's body, and then he walked off.**

"**Lets go, we have to catch up with the others."**

"**Interesting." Hikari mused, Sai made another bird and they hopped on following Neji and Lee from the sky.**

"**What happened to Sora-chan!" Naruto asked loudly, taking her from Lee so that Sakura could heal his wounds.**

"**She fainted from over using her chakra." Hikari explained.**

"**What happened to Talia?" Nala asked coming over to Hikari with Kiba holding her hand.**

"**She doesn't want to come back to us, she said she'd rather be with Sasuke and she also mentioned to leave her be. She has no attachment to us whatsoever."**

"**No way!" Nala gasped.**

"**And what of Sasuke?" Kakashi asked.**

"**Uchiha Sasuke and Uchiha Itachi were battling each other to the death it seems. Sasuke killed Itachi and a masked Akatsuki member came and took them away." Neji filled in.**

"**The same one we talked to!" Naruto exclaimed.**

**Kakashi hid his surprise well as he said, "Right then lets get going back to Konoha."**

~O~O~O~

I hope you enjoyed that one…I know that nothing is in chronological order but it is a fanfiction right? so I can change some things

Itachi was probably OOC and I apologize for that…I think my OC was OOC as well.

And I'm just wondering if I should continue with this story, I'm having a bit of writers block: (


	6. Chapter 6

Chapter 5

When they finally reached Konoha, Sora hadn't woken up yet and Nala and Hikari took her back home as everyone else went their separate ways home. Kakashi had gone to report to Tsunade about their mission.

Hikari and Nala knelt by Sora's beside.

"Did she see Itachi?" Nala asked quietly.

"Yeah. I think they talked as well, but Neji won't say anything."

"Do you think it was that bad?"

"For her to exhaust her chakra, knowing what it would do to her, I'm guessing yes."

"And Talia…" Nala let her question drift.

"Sora's not going to like this."

"But how could she do this to us, were best friends, sisters, our elements are supposed to be together." Nala said, for once she wasn't in a jolly mood or hyper.

"I guess Sasuke just means more to her then us." Hikari shrugged

"I wouldn't choose Kiba over you guys, no matter how much I love him." Nala said quietly.

Neji didn't know why he was doing this; he didn't know what great source possessed him into doing this, why humanity would allow such a thing. _Knock, knock_.

Maybe it wasn't too late; after all he probably wasn't in his right state of mind.

"Neji-kun? Come on in."

"Hello Nala, I just wanted to know how Sora was doing." Neji said he felt all awkward as he stepped in the house. Nala led him to the living room where Hikari was.

"Neji." she nodded at him, he nodded back curtly.

"I think she's doing okay. She hasn't woken up yet, must have been a pretty rough day for yesterday, huh?" Nala said narrowing her eyes at him.

"Yeah, I'll just be going now." Neji rubbed the back of his neck.

"Why don't you take a seat Neji?" Hikari gestured towards a couch. Neji sat down.

"Tell us!" Nala demanded straight away.

"Tell you?" Neji asked slowly.

"What happened with Itachi?" Hikari said as though it were that simple.

"Maybe she should tell you herself."

"Sora? Yeah right, she doesn't tell us anything anymore." Nala sighed.

"Maybe she has a reason." Neji pointed out.

"Please Neji, tell us. She's our best friend and were worried sick about her." Hikari pleaded.

Neji was silent for a minute, "Itachi just talked to her. Something about feeling horrible about what he'd done to her and that he was sorry. Sora asked him to stay with her and he told her that he couldn't, that his time was up…then they…kissed and that was it." Neji felt like hitting something at the last part. It's not like he enjoyed watching Sora and Itachi make out and he surely did not like remembering it.

"Really? Was it like a real make out session or just…"

"Nala!" Hikari scolded, Nala just grinned.

"Well thank you Neji for telling us that." Hikari nodded her thanks.

"What did he do to her?" Neji couldn't help but ask, Nala and Hikari exchanged glances, and Nala shrugged, "He already knows so much, might as well tell him the rest."

Hikari sighed, "This all started when we were with Orochimaru. Sasuke had turned 16 and Orochimaru began to think about letting Sasuke turn 18 before using him. So that he'd be in a stronger and more powerful body. Naturally he needed another host so he sent the strongest of us, Sora, into luring Itachi to Orochimaru. Heaven knows how much he'd tried to get Itachi, but he was just too powerful."

Nala nodded, "He locked Talia, Hikari and I up in a room just so that Sora would agree to this otherwise he'd kill us. Sora's first encounter with Itachi was in a fight, he seemed to immediately like her, with her interesting personality and beautiful looks. Itachi made a deal with her, if he were to win a fight with her, she would have to come with him. Sora fought Itachi with all her strength and she was close to beating him but in the end she made herself lose and went to the Akatsuki hideout with Itachi."

"Wait, how would you know all this if Sora was in the Akatsuki hideout? I'm pretty sure they wouldn't let her go as she pleases." Neji asked

"She left two fire clones, one with us and the other to report to Orochimaru." Nala explained, Neji nodded.

"Anyways so Sora spent almost 6 months with Itachi…"

"6 months? I thought Orochimaru needed a host?" Neji asked.

"He still had time from his other body, and he wanted to take things with Itachi carefully so he gave Sora a time limit of 8 months. During these 6 months Sora wouldn't stop talking about Itachi…"

Nala interrupted Hikari, "How hot he was and sexy and amazing and sweet and wonderful…"

"Yeah Nala, I think we got it." Hikari shook her head at her best friend.

Neji didn't want to listen to how amazing Sora thought Itachi was. It just made breaking things all the more tempting.

"It seemed that Sora loved itachi too much. She was almost near tears when she'd talk about having to give him over to Orochimaru, so she told Itachi who she was really and what her mission was. Itachi was furious, he thought that everything, all that happened during those 6 months were all lies and ways to seduce him. He locked Sora up leaving her there for weeks without food and constant interrogating and torture."

"It was terrifying, anything they would do to her, would reflect on her clone and we had to sit there and listen to Sora's screams." Nala shivered slightly.

Neji clenched his fists. Who did this bastard Uchiha think he was?

"Sora couldn't tell them anything because of a jutsu Orochimaru had performed so even if she wanted to end the pain they were inflicting upon her, she couldn't. And besides she loved Itachi no matter what he was doing to her she still loved him. We told her to stop this over and over again but it was no use we told her he was bad and dangerous not to mention 5 years older then her." Hikari said.

"It turns out one night Itachi decided to get really, really drunk and visit Sora." Nala said with disgust.

Neji was already considering telling them to stop that he didn't want to know anymore.

Nala went on, "So drunk Itachi starts to beat her and make her go through intense genjutsu, and then he unties her and instead shackles her hands above her head. Then he starts to…well he touches her…and he…"

"I don't want to hear anymore." Neji breathed.

Nala was crying quietly while Hikari was just silent.

"How could she still love him after…all that?" Neji wondered.

"He was the only love she knew. Being Orochimaru's lab rats we don't exactly get the same freedom as normal teenage girls." Hikari answered.

"That's…sad."

"Don't let her hear you say that!" Nala said, "If she knows that your showing the slightest bit of pity towards her or feel sorry for her she'll castrate you and rip you apart limb from limb then she'll murder us for the heck of it."

Neji nodded his eyes slightly wide.

"So I suppose you want to see her now?" Hikari asked.

"Not really I should…"

Neji sighed lowly; he had been practically thrown into sora's room. Well since he was here…neji slowly walked towards the giant bed where sora was lying. She indeed looked peaceful when she was asleep. Her long hair was sprayed around her and her full lips were slightly parted as she slept soundly, her hands were resting by her side, and when neji's gaze drifted down her body he noticed the very curvy form. He quickly averted his eyes his face tingeing with red.

He looked around the room to be quite surprised. He actually expected dead bodies hanging around thousands of weapons scattered all over the place and maybe a collection of torture utensils instead the room was…elegant. It was a mixture of the colors black white and grey with assorted candles decorating the place. To the side was a giant bookcase filled with books. Neji curiously went up to the bookcase, there were literature books, history, manga and…Neji sweat dropped…Icha Icha Paradise.

On the other side was a desk with papers neatly arranged and some pictures on the wall. One was of Sora, Talia, Nala, Hikari and Sasuke. Sora and Sasuke had their arms crossed glaring at each other, Nala was holding up peace signs and sticking her tongue out with a wink. Talia had her arm around Sasuke grinning while Hikari was between Sora and Sasuke smiling wearily. Neji smiled a bit at that picture. There was another with only the four girls they were all grinning and laughing.

Neji went around the giant bedroom, just observing everything it seemed as though there was so much he didn't know about Sora. He left the room with a smile.

Neji said his goodbyes to Nala and Hikari and then left.

The next day Sora still hadn't woken up during noon Kiba had come over and gone upstairs with Nala. Hikari stayed downstairs sitting on the couch thinking.

A sudden knock at the door had her jumping up and running to the door.

"Shit." she cussed putting a hand on her chest. She was pretty startled.

Hikari took a deep breath to calm herself and she opened the door…the person at the door didn't exactly help with calming down the nerves.

"Sai? Come on in."

Sai smiled as he came into the house. Hikari led him to the living room and she gestured for him to take a seat.

"How are you?" he asked her.

"Well. Do you want something to drink? Tea?"

"No thank you I'm fine. How's Sora doing?"

Hikari came and sat next to Sai.

"She hasn't woken up yet, I'm…worried about her." Hikari admitted.

"Everything will be okay. Sora's strong, she get through this." Sai smiled

"I hope so."

Hikari was surprised when Sai came closer to her and put an arm around her. He kissed her forehead, "Please don't worry."

Hikari closed her eyes and slowly leaned into Sai, resting her head on his chest. Being in Sai's arms made her feel safe, it made her want to stop worrying.

"Thank you." she said softly as she put an arm around his waist, snuggling closer to him.

"I read that when two people love each other that they become closer friends of some sort, though I can't remember the terms used for it." Sai frowned.

Hikari smiled, "You mean girlfriend and boyfriend?"

"Oh…yes, so is that what we are?" Sai asked his inexperience in the most human of things made Hikari want to laugh.

"Well I don't know you haven't asked me to be your girlfriend." she smirked.

Sai turned himself to face her catching her gaze, his coal eyes looking deep into her grey eyes.

"Hikari, will you be my girlfriend?" his face was dead serious.

Hikari grinned and wrapped her arms around his neck, "Of course."

"Goddamn, my head." Sora woke up feeling dreary. She sat up slowly in her bed rubbing her temples, she looked around her room, frowning. She looked down at herself, she was wearing a tank top and a pair of navy ninja pants. She got up and went to the bathroom and walked down the flight of stairs.

It felt like she was running down a steep mountain and no matter how hard she'd try she couldn't go slower. She gripped the railing tighter as she finally made her way down the stairs.

Rubbing her eyes with a yawn she stepped into the living room.

"Fucking hell."

Why is it that she always had to catch her friends like this?

Hikari and Sai broke apart. Hikari turning a deep shade of red and Sai just waved and smiled.

"Sora, it's nice to see that you're finally awake."

"Yeah, yeah. What on fucking earth happened, my head hurts and pounds like fucking hell itself." Sora groaned.

"Uh sora…you um…passed out for…like two days and a half now…h...h...ow are you…feeling?"

"Like I said. Head. Pounding. Like fuck." Sora then looked back and forth from Hikari to Sai.

"Wait don't tell me…you two are together?"

"Yes." Sai said brightly.

Sora rolled her eyes, "_Right_."

She then left to the kitchen.

"Sai, I'll see you later okay?" Hikari ushered Sai out of the house and she practically ran to the kitchen.

"You found out that Sai and I are together and all you said was 'right' no castration threats, no tearing us limb from limb? Not even a lecture? Or swearing? Or even yelling? You don't even want to kill us? Or murder us in our beds? Or even…"

"Hikari!" Sora stopped her, "My head seriously hurts like fucking hell, and not to mention the fact that my room reeks of male. A sort of rainforest scented male and also Nala is up there in bed with Kiba doing hell knows what!"

"Right sorry." Hikari grimaced, "But really sora?"

"Whatever Hikari. If you like this weird ass sai, it's _your_ life and maybe he's a good guy for you. If nala wants to have a good fuck with kiba, it's _her_ virginity."

"Aw you're just being crude." Hikari frowned.

"Seriously Hikari, you're older then me and you deserve someone who will love you, like Sai. I don't care about yours or Nala's relationships anymore. All I'm going to say is men aren't what they seem, no matter how much you want them to be the man that you want, it'll all just come back and bite you in the ass." Sora took out random food items from the fridge, throwing them to the table neatly.

"Well thank you Sora, you know we love you right?"

"Yeah, yeah, now go away I need to eat." Sora grumbled.

"Okay, enjoy." Hikari grinned as she left the kitchen knowing that was sora's way of saying she loved them too. Hikari sweat dropped, or sora really wanted her to get lost. She quickly stuck head into the kitchen.

"Oh and the rainforest-scented male was Neji. He came by to see how you were yesterday, wasn't that sweet of him?"

"Yeah the bastard is just so goddamn sweet. That fucking asshole." Sora broke the glass of water in her bare hands.

"I'll be going now!" Hikari ran away.

Kiba came down quietly careful not to disturb Hikari. He tip toed towards the door.

"Yo hikari, where the fuck are the…hello mutt." Sora sneered.

"Uh Sora-san…hi! You're feeling better?" Kiba laughed nervously.

"Good enough to castrate young men such as yourself? Why of course." Sora gave him a sarcastically sweet smile then she quickly frowned at him and nodded towards the door, "Get lost."

"Yes right away Sora-san!" Kiba ran out quickly.

Sora sighed and trudged up the stairs. She knocked on Nala's door.

"J…just a second!" Nala croaked.

Sora opened the door to find Nala limping towards the bed.

"Sora! You're all better!" she winced.

"Sit down already, your going to be sore for a while." Sora rolled her eyes.

Nala turned a shade of red and sat down, "And here…your favorite." Sora tossed her something quickly.

"Dango sticks! Thanks Sora! How are you by the way?"

"Fine Nala, just fine." Sora sat next to her leaning on her hands. "I came down with a fucking headache to catch Hikari making out with Sai."

"Really? I mean…"

"Whatever Nala, it doesn't matter now. Hikari likes Sai and I guess that's all that matters."

"You don't care about who were with anymore?"

"Its not like I don't care, it's that I don't want to seem to be controlling you guys."

"Thanks Sora"

"No problem, so how was Kiba?"

Nala smiled, "He was gentle, and you know everything was so soft and tender. He was being really nice to me, just the end stung a bit."

"Yeah, yeah, its not like I wanna hear about your fuck with Kiba but its good that he was…gentle…anyways I gotta go to the kitchen. I'm starving." Sora got up and walked to the door.

"Wait, Sora, you called him Kiba." Nala smiled practically beaming.

"Yeah well can't call him dog boy and mutt for the rest of his life can I?"

"Fucking hell, were out of food." Sora muttered the next day. She went to check through the cabinets to find nothing, not even a cereal box. She checked the fridge once more and it was empty except for a carton of milk.

"You guys! Why the fuck don't we have food in this entire kitchen!" Sora yelled out.

"Because, you ate all the food." Hikari shook her head.

"Dang Sora! I know your appetite is gigundanormous but really?" Nala said looking through the kitchen.

"A girls gotta eat and gigundanormous isn't a word."

"Yeah well there isn't a word specific enough to explain your appetite." Nala stuck her tongue out at her childishly.

"Relax, we can just go buy more food." Hikari said taking out a wallet from the drawer.

"Who's gonna go?" Nala asked.

"Me!" Sora raised her hand, with a grin plastered on her face.

"Nala go with her." Hikari sighed, "Besides I'm having a visitor."

Nala grinned knowingly while Sora just took the wallet from Hikari's hands.

"Play safe." she called behind her as Nala ran after her.

"And this one, and that one, oh don't forget to get that one. And this and this and a little bit of this."

"Sora! This is all so heavy!" Nala whimpered as she took stuff off the store shelves. She had an armful of food items in her hands; Sora sighed and began picking out stuff herself.

They came out of that store with handfuls of grocery bags.

"Lets go to that store next!" Sora hurried off.

"We can't carry anymore bags!" Nala groaned.

"SORA-CHAN!" Naruto came running up to them.

"Oh hey Naruto, mind helping us out?" Sora said absently as she inspected the labels on a chips bag.

"Uh sure?"

Nala sighed in relief and gave Naruto the bags she was carrying.

"So Sora you're all better now?" Naruto asked as he easily carried the bags.

"Yep. Hey which do you guys think is better, barbeque or original?"

"Barbeque." Nala and Naruto answered in unison.

"Well that's awesome, everyone was really worried about you." Naruto was saying.

"Well I don't need their worry. I can take care of myself." Sora huffed.

Naruto grinned knowing that was Sora's way of appreciating everyone's worry about her…or not.

"Well as long as you can take care of yourself, what do you say about coming to Sakura's tonight for a sleepover?"

"Wait a guys AND girls sleepover?" Nala asked jaw dropping.

"Yeah, what's wrong with that?" Naruto asked clearly clueless.

"Nothing we'll be there." Sora grinned slyly. She took the bags from Naruto as she finished up shopping, "Now run along and tell Sakura to make sure her house is loaded with food."

Naruto grinned, "Believe it!" he then ran off.

"Seriously Sora?" Nala sweat dropped.

"Come on it'll be fun; we'll have a chance at tormenting the boys."

Sora walked off smugly and Nala shook her head.

"I have the feeling we'll being witnessing a castration massacre." she then quickly ran after Sora.

"Yo Hikari, were coming in! So you better not be making out or anything!" Sora hollered out before kicking the door open.

She and Nala peered around the place. There was nobody there. They went into the kitchen and set the groceries down on the counters. They began organizing the food items, with sora eating half during the process.

"Oh hey you guys back so soon?" Hikari was standing in the doorway, a smile on her face.

"Where's Sai?" Sora asked narrowing her eyes and peering behind Hikari.

"Oh he just left." Hikari shrugged as she helped Nala reached a high shelf.

"Hikari, you have no idea what torture I had to go through! Sora made me carry grocery bags! _A lot_ of grocery bags!"

"Aw poor baby." Hikari crooned as she gently pat Nala's head. Nala was fake crying.

"Grow up." Sora rolled her eyes.

"Oh and pack your things were going to a sleepover tonight!" Nala grinned.

"A…Sleepover?"

"Hiya Sakura!" Nala grinned holding up the peace sign.

"Hey you guys glad you could make it, come on in!" Sakura smiled ushering them in. Sakura had redecorated her giant living room. She had moved the couches and furniture away and most of their friends were already there seated around giant pillows and smaller pillows. In fact the entire ground was covered in sleeping bags and pillows.

"Love what you've done with the place." Sora whistled.

Sakura laughed as Hikari, Nala and Sora set up their stuff. Naruto was there along with Ino, Choji, Shikamaru, and Sai.

Hikari immediately sat with Sai, and while everyone began talking, the doorbell rang again. Sakura jumped up to get it.

She came back with Lee and Kiba who was dragging Shino by the collar.

"Kiba!" Nala hugged her boyfriend; they sat down with Nala in Kiba's lap. Sakura sat with Lee, kissing every few seconds.

"Man, this is way too troublesome." Shikamaru sighed.

"It's troublesome like fucking hell." Sora grumbled.

"Wanna play shoji (sp?)?" Shikamaru asked whipping out a shoji (sp?) board.

"Sure, I was actually feeling like beating somebody." Sora smirked.

"You seem pretty confident." Shikamaru frowned.

"Its not called confidence it's called _knowing_"

Shikamaru narrowed his eyes at Sora and the two began their game.

While they're game went on, everyone else had come over to Sakura's house. Tenten had arrived, Temari was in the village due to the chuunin exams and decided to stop by and finally Hinata came in with a frowning Neji behind her. Hinata had become much more open and her shyness had vanished once Naruto told her he liked her and the two made out at Hikari, Nala and Sora's party.

Hinata came and kissed Naruto lightly sitting up close to him. Naruto grinned widely, wrapping an arm around her. Neji was fuming at the sight of his cousin with the Uzumaki.

"Ha! I beat you!" Sora burst out leaning back on her hands. Shikamaru sighed in frustration looking over the shoji board. He couldn't find anything wrong, but Sora had beaten him so easily. People say that Shikamaru is five steps ahead of everyone but Sora…she was at least 20 strides ahead.

"Nice, you beat Shikamaru." Temari nodded high fiving Sora.

"Whose side are you on woman?" Shikamaru grumbled, pulling her up close to him. Temari blushed slightly and pecked his lips.

"I'm always on your side." she grinned.

"Traitor." Sora muttered at Shikamaru who gave her a smirk. Sora walked off towards Tenten and Ino who were the only girls not with a guy.

"I'm so glad you guys are here. Isn't it great being single?" sora smiled.

Tenten and Ino looked at her and they smiled guiltily. Sora face palmed.

"Dear kami."

"He's an anbu and he's hot." Ino shrugged.

"Anbu are really mysterious and intriguing." Tenten added.

"Yeah, yeah." Sora went off towards two other single people in the room.

"Hey Shino, Choji."

"Sora you're feeling better it seems." Shino said in his usual weird voice.

"Oh yeah." Sora nodded.

"Hey Sora. Wow you're one of the only girls here that isn't being kissed by a guy." Choji laughed. The three looked around them to see various couples making out.

"So since you're here anyways I have a question." Choji said a bit shyly.

"Go ahead, Choj." Sora grinned.

"Well you see my girlfriend…"

"Girlfriend? You have a girlfriend?" Sora's mouth dropped.

"Well yeah, she was an old family friend that came to visit us and well you know…anyways what I was going to ask…"

"Do you have a girlfriend?" Sora leered at Shino.

"Do I have a girlfriend? Why yes, I met her on a mission to the land of rain."

Sora face palmed, "What the fuck is the matter with everybody!"

She stalked off away from the two people she thought she could rely on to be there for her.

"I didn't get to ask you my question!" Choji called after her.

Sora walked away grumbling, to run into a certain Hyuuga.

"Hyuuga." Sora muttered.

"Sora, you seem to be…awake." Neji smirked.

"Oh fuck off, what did you miss being beat to a pulp these couple of days?" Sora asked sarcastically.

"Of course, having a couple of bruise free days is just a horror for me." Neji mocked.

"I bet it is."

"All joking aside. I didn't get to give you something." Neji said his expression serious.

"Well aren't you full of surprises?" Sora rolled her eyes, "I don't want anything from you Hyuuga."

"It's not from me…he told me to give it to you." Neji held out a necklace. Itachi's necklace.

Sora glared at it long and hard and finally took it from Neji with a sigh; she clasped it around her neck.

Neji got angry for some reason, "You're just going to accept it and put it on?"

"Why not? It's my necklace." Sora said warily.

Neji fumed silently.

"They told you didn't they?" Sora's expression hardened.

"No."

"Don't lie to me Hyuuga." she said harshly.

"What are you going to do to me?"

"What more can I do except hate you?"

"Why do you hate me? What did I ever do to you?" Neji asked frowning.

"Oh all of a sudden you care what I think?" Sora snapped. She looked at Neji fiercely. "Listen Hyuuga, I don't care that you know about me and…I just don't care, but lets get one thing straight. I. Am. Not. Weak."

"Sora! Come on were playing spin the bottle!" Nala called.

"Why the hell are we playing spin the bottle if all of you have girlfriends and boyfriends?" Sora muttered sitting in between Nala and Hinata.

Everyone had gotten in a circle.

"Aw come on it'll be fun. We don't have to make out with the person. Besides were all friends here, a simple peck on the lips shouldn't be a bother." Sakura grinned.

"Like fuck it won't." Sora grumbled.

"Wait! I don't like the odds here. What if it lands on the same gender?" Kiba frowned.

"You kiss em, your up first!" Tenten gave the bottle to Kiba.

Kiba shrugged and grinned as he spun the bottle. What are the odds that it landed on Nala?

"Cheater!" everyone said.

Kiba grinned wider as he gave Nala a quick kiss. Most of the guys seemed to cheat as well. With Naruto making it land on Hinata. Shikamaru on Temari. Lee decided not to cheat as it was frowned upon by Guy-sensei.

"If this doesn't land on Sakura, I shall do 200 laps around the village!" Lee declared.

Sakura giggled as everyone sighed. To Lee's demise it landed on none other then Tenten. Lee looked at Sakura and Sakura just gave him a reassuring smile. Lee went up to Tenten.

"Go on Lee were friends and we both have mates." Tenten shrugged. Lee gave her a quick peck and sat back with Sakura. Shino spun next and it landed on Ino.

"Close your eyes please." Shino murmured to Ino. Ino shut her eyes and she felt soft full lips quickly kiss her. She opened her eyes to find Shino zipping his jacket back up. After Choji's landed on Hikari it was Neji's turn.

"This is boring as hell itself, why are we doing this again?" Sora whispered grimly to Nala.

"Come on its fun. Next we get to watch a movie!" Nala laughed quietly.

Suddenly there was a slight gasp around the teenagers; Sora raised a brow as she turned her head. She was met with a certain pair of wary white eyes.

"What the fuck, Hyuuga?" Sora backed away in reflex.

Neji looked at the bottle which was pointing at Sora.

"She's not allowed to castrate me is she?" Neji asked to no one in particular still focused on Sora.

"Nope it's a game, so kiss her good!" Nala grinned.

Sora was practically fuming as Neji's face inched closer to hers.

"Please don't kill me." he murmured before he pressed his lips to hers gently. He backed away quickly then.

"To fuck with this game." Sora growled.

Neji couldn't believe he'd just kissed _Sora_, _he kissed her_! She was going to kill him for sure afterwards. Neji could still feel the touch of her lips on his. Her lips were really soft and full, her bottom lip was slightly fuller then her upper lip, and her scent was still lingering. A gentle smell of vanilla.

Neji mentally whacked himself, wondering why he was over thinking a simple peck on the lips. It's not like their were tongues involved or clothes being mercilessly ripped off and…holy fucking hell…

Neji gave himself a stronger mental whack and turned a slight shade of red.

"Something wrong dude?" Kiba asked.

"No it's just the room is pretty warm." Neji shook his head, mentally whacking himself over and over again.

"I say we put on a romance." Ino suggested as Sakura searched through her DVD's.

"Uh no! A scary movie so we can all hug our guys." Nala frowned, clinging onto Kiba.

"You're already hugging your guy. Put on a movie filled with blood and guts and people ripping each others heads off and drinking the blood then…."

"Oh hell no, I say comedy." Tenten shook her head, scared shitless from Sora.

"Ugh lets just watch a romance." Sakura sighed as she put on the movie then she hurried to sit next to Lee. Everyone sat huddled together except Sora who was sharpening a kunai knife. Snickering at every cheesy line a guy would say in the movie.

It was a sappy romance movie where the couple dies in the end. Most of the girls were tearing up while Sora snorted shaking her head. She received several glares, though amused looks from the guys who were also tiring of this movie.

The movie was nearing the end and the girl watched as her lover was killed by a man who claimed to love her. The scene was very similar to Sora's encounter with Itachi. And Neji, Hikari and Nala were watching Sora stare at the screen with a hard look on her face.

The end of the movie came when the girl killed herself after the other guy who loved her tried to get her.

"Can we sleep now?" Sora asked her expression blank.

"No we haven't gossiped or talked or exchanged stories yet!" Sakura exclaimed. Everyone got into their sleeping bags and places.

"Who wants to start?" Sakura asked then.

The night went on with everyone laughing as they talked of old missions and past situations. It was well past midnight nearing 3 o'clock in the morning when everyone slowly began falling asleep.

It was a great sleepover to say the least and everyone was happy that they got a chance to hang out and have fun with their friends.

**~O~O~O**

**So…what did you think? I'm sort of running out of ideas here so I'm kind of improvising at the moment *nervous laugh* sorry!**


	7. Chapter 7

**Just wanted to give a huge shout out to my very first reviewer: invincible shadow, thanks so much! Your review really made my day! And just so you know your suggestion really had me thinking and now I'm going to try and go along with it…but not just yet.**

**Chapter 6**

The next day Sora had gathered Hikari and Nala together in the living room for a meeting.

"What's this about sora?" hikari asked.

Sora frowned, "We've been here for a long time now right?"

"Yeah." Nala nodded.

"Well we haven't exactly had the chance to discuss _certain_ things."

"Like?" Hikari wondered.

"What are we going to do about Talia?" Sora sighed.

"She wants to stay with Sasuke." Nala shrugged.

"She feels no attachment to us whatsoever." Hikari said.

"The only reason we agreed to stay in Konoha was _because_ of Talia." Sora pointed out.

"What do you mean? You want us to leave?" Nala asked looking worried.

"If you two hadn't found boyfriends yes that would be the case." Sora rolled her eyes. "But what I really meant was…what is our purpose here?"

"We're Konoha ninja." Nala said simply.

"And?" Sora asked.

"And that's it. We are now ninja's who will be loyal to Konoha. We will go out on missions our Hokage gives us and we will train to become stronger." Hikari concluded.

"Yep!" Nala grinned.

"Fine, but also the boyfriend situation." Sora glared at Hikari and Nala, "there are going to be some rules around here."

Hikari and Nala sighed.

"First of all if you two are going out be sure to be back by midnight. If your taking them to your rooms be sure to have the room sound proofed because I don't want to hear what you people are doing next door."

Hikari and Nala nodded warily.

"And lastly, if I sense that you two have been hurt in any way…those boys are dead and we are leaving this place."

"But…"

"No buts Nala!"

"Fine, fine we agree." Hikari said, and then she smiled, "But those rules apply to you as well, Sora."

"What?"

"Aw come on, you and Neji! You two are clearly the perfect match! You'd make the hottest couple ever!" Nala grinned.

Sora had a vein popping in her head. "Me and Hyuuga? Like hell…which reminds me…you two told Hyuuga about me?"

Hikari and Nala gulped as Sora leered at them, she then let out a sigh.

"Whatever, I gotta go train." then Sora left and Hikari and Nala let out a sigh of relief.

"She didn't murder us." Nala said.

"Strange." Hikari murmured.

"No its not it's a miracle! Maybe she does like Neji after all but she's in this love triangle because of Itachi and she doesn't know whether she can really move on or not!" Nala explained. Hikari and Nala shared a look.

"Nah!" they both said shaking their heads.

Hikari was walking towards Sai's apartment as she had been invited to come over. She felt unusually perky and had butterflies in her stomach.

She knocked on his door hesitantly, and when Sai opened it the two shared a long kiss.

"Come on in" Sai smiled. Breathless, Hikari stepped into the apartment looking around. There were paint supplies put everywhere neatly. Sai led her to his couch where Hikari sat in Sai's arms.

"Were you painting?" Hikari asked.

"I'm always painting." Sai smiled.

Hikari also smiled and snuggled closer to Sai. He kissed the top of her head.

"We have a mission tomorrow." Sai remembered.

"Just me and you?" Hikari asked looking up at him and caressing his face. Sai nodded turning his face to kiss her fingers.

Hikari grinned, "This will be fun."

"Of course it will precious."

"Wait, wait…you want us to do what? You do realize that you're talking about the two most terrifying people in all of Konoha. They'll have our heads!"

"Don't you love me, Kiba?"

Kiba sighed running a hand through his messy hair, "Of course I love you. That's why I don't want to see you murdered alive by your best friend."

Nala laughed kissing Kiba's lips, "Sora won't kill me besides she and Neji belong together, but they're stubborn and clueless. All we have to do is push them in the right direction."

"I don't know nal."

"Come on Kiba! Please?" Nala made puppy eyes at her boyfriend, making Kiba practically melt in his spot.

"Damn it, you know I cant say no to that face." Kiba growled, pulling her up close and pressing a firm kiss to her lips.

"I know." Nala laughed kissing him back.

Sora went to the training fields; she really needed to punch something and get all her anger out.

"Come out Hyuuga, I know you're here."

"Why do insist on calling me by my family name." Neji appeared leaning on tree arms crossed.

"The only people I call by name are people I like, _Hyuuga._" Sora smirked as Neji rolled his eyes.

"I didn't know a stone heart was capable of such feelings. How comforting to know that it is."

Sora got into a fighting stance, "I'm not the only one with a stone heart."

"Why am I not surprised to know that all you want from me is a spar." Neji said getting into his own stance, letting her comment slide.

"I don't want a spar, Hyuuga Neji, I want a full on battle." Sora ran at him.

The two fought hard and Neji had been able to land two hits on her stomach. Two hits which could have easily been dodged.

"Could you just dodge already? Another hit and you'll be seriously injured." Neji said as he skidded back from Sora's raging fire.

"Oh grow up will you! People get injured in battles all the time. Could you just hit me already?" Sora growled. Her lips were a blood red from coughing up blood.

Neji glared at her, "I don't _want_ to hurt you!"

Sora blinked back, stopping her attack mid-flight. Neji mentally kicked himself.

"What I meant was I don't want a sadistic torturer after my ass if I hurt you."

Sora put on an eerie grin, "You really are full of yourself aren't you Hyuuga. You think that you're actually capable of hurting me." Sora let out a short laugh.

Neji shook his head, "I don't care what you think of me. I'm not falling for your mind games anymore." Neji began walking away.

Sora went after him, "What about our fight?"

"It's over. You win and you can find someone else to be your battle pawn."

"You can't just leave!"

"Why not?" Neji asked her.

"Because…well because…"

Neji raised a brow.

"Okay I can't explain it to you without it seeming like a compliment or me sounding unlike myself." Sora admitted. This truly aroused Neji's curiosity. He wanted to know what Sora had to say.

"Tell me." he demanded.

"Taijustu spar?"

Neji sighed, "Everything is a battle to you isn't it?" he got into a stance.

"Battles are easier to face then reality." Sora shrugged as she and Neji began a taijutsu spar.

"So will you tell me now?" Neji asked dodging a kick to his side.

Sora frowned.

"It's not like I'll tell anyone, and if you want we can treat this conversation as though it never happened." Neji said.

Sora sighed, putting her hands up in an x to block Neji's fist.

"The thing is…the only reason I spar with you is because you're the only person who can handle my attacks without getting seriously hurt."

"You're calling me strong?" Neji internally grinned.

"Don't let it get to your head, Hyuuga." Too late.

"And also because you know about…me." Neji noticed something in her jade eyes flicker as she said this, "I fight you to prove to you that I'm not weak. Just because Nala and Hikari told you about I…Itachi." Neji caught the stumble on the Uchiha's name. "It doesn't mean I'm weak, and I don't want you to think that."

"I _don't_ think you're weak." Neji found the words coming out of his mouth. Sora's jade eyes flashed to his.

"You are the strongest kunoichi I have ever met. When your friends told me about that incident the only thing that crossed my mind was 'wow she's strong' you don't need to prove anything to me. You already have proven your strength, your capability and to tell you the truth it frightens me to know how powerful you are. Especially when I get the feeling that you're still holding back. When we fight it is I who feels the need to prove myself to you. That I am capable of fighting you and that you don't need to go easy on me."

Their fighting had stopped and a real smile was slowly forming on Sora's lips.

"I never thought you could talk for so long." she smiled. Neji frowned, and Sora laughed, the sweet sound brought a smirk to Neji's lips.

"This conversation never happened." he reminded her.

"Naturally." Sora nodded.

"I'll be going now." Neji bowed his head slightly and he turned to leave.

"Neji." Neji's eyes widened at the sound of his name coming from Sora. He turned to look at her.

"Thank you." she smiled, and then she was gone.

"You're leaving!" Nala wailed the next day.

"Nala chill, it's only for a mission. It's not for life or anything." Hikari rolled her eyes.

"You and Sai?" Sora asked, twisting the lollipop in her mouth.

"Yeah, it's only a B rank mission, but it'll take about a week."

"What will we do without you!" Nala continued on as Hikari packed her bag.

"Don't forget protection." Sora commented. Nala and Hikari froze staring at Sora, shocked, "What? It's not like we want to see you come back pregnant."

Hikari turned a dark shade of red while Nala laughed, Sora also smirked.

"Well…I…um have to go now." Hikari stuttered out. Nala ran at her giving her a huge hug.

"Nala you're suffocating me."

"Oops, sorry!"

Hikari turned to Sora, who held out a lollipop to her. Hikari smiled accepting the lollipop, "Thanks sora, I'll miss you too."

"Stay safe and be careful. Don't let your guard down."

Hikari nodded and left her two best friends.

"So…what should we do?" Sora asked, sticking a lollipop in her mouth.

Nala grinned widely, "I'm glad you asked!"

"I don't see why I have to get changed." Sora muttered holding up a kimono.

"Well because it's an awesome festival and celebrations call for formal dressing." Nala reasoned.

"Why do I have to come anyways, you and Kiba are just going to be making out the entire time." Sora rolled her eyes.

"You have to come! Please, please, please, please…"

"Okay! Okay! Fucking hell, just stop with the pleases!"

While Sora went to get changed, Nala grinned slyly rubbing her hands together evilly.

"Woooooooow!" Nala gushed once Sora had come out of her room.

"Shut up." she muttered, sticking a lollipop in her mouth.

"It's not my fault, you look totally drool worthy! I bet your gonna have a lot of guys watching you tonight!"

Sora grumbled something too low for Nala to hear. The door bell rang then and Nala all but flew towards the door.

"Sora! Kiba's here lets go!"

"Damn you people." Sora said walking towards the door, throwing out the lollipop on the way.

"Uh…Sora…hi!" Kiba said eyes wide.

"Doesn't she look beautiful?" Nala gushed.

"Nala cut the crap, before I castrate your boyfriend." Sora muttered going out the door with Nala and Kiba following her.

"Why is it always me?" Kiba asked.

"Because, Sora loves me too much to harm me." Nala grinned, "Besides, she wouldn't _really_ castrate you…"

Kiba gulped as Nala trailed on.

"Is everything in place?" Nala whispered to Kiba. Kiba nodded, grinning slightly.

Nala gave a squeal of delight.

"Come on you two, at the pace your going the festival will be over by the time we fucking get there." Sora called out.

Neji sighed, resting his face in his palm and drumming his fingers on the table. He didn't know why the hell he was dragged here but Hinata insisted that he come to the festival with her and Naruto and hiashi-sama also mentioned that Neji should go and have fun.

Hinata and Naruto were talking about their training and Neji didn't exactly want to converse with his cousin and her boyfriend…he could be training right now…

"Oh hey there's Kiba!" Naruto said then, "yo Kiba!" Naruto waved. Neji sighed once more.

"Sora-san looks beautiful doesn't she Neji-nii-san?" Hinata said quietly.

Neji lazily looked over to where Kiba and his girlfriend were coming over to them. Behind them was Sora…Neji's eyes widened. Sora was clad in a black kimono with intricate white designs covering it and a white obi tied around her thin waist. Some of her long hair had been put up into a bun while the rest cascaded down her back. Her face showed a trace of make up, but still showed the delicate paleness of her fair soft-looking skin which brought out her fierce jade eyes.

Hinata giggled slightly at her cousin's expression which snapped Neji back to the present and he quickly composed himself.

Everyone greeted each other and Naruto begun laughing.

"You girls look great!" he put his hand on Hinata's, who blushed slightly.

"Thanks Naruto, you look quite dashing yourself." Nala grinned.

"Who's ready to eat!" Kiba asked rubbing his hands together.

Nala coughed, "Um Kiba honey, I saw a really good place to eat over there."

"Oh right…do you guys mind?" Kiba asked the rest of his friends.

"Not at all." Hinata smiled. Nala gave her a quick wink before she and Kiba left quickly. Hinata and Sora were sitting on one side of the table while Naruto and Neji sat on the other.

Hinata lightly kicked Naruto under the table.

"Ow! I mean…oh Hinata look at that ramen stand over there! Lets go!" Naruto rubbed the back of his head.

"Of course Naruto-kun. Sora-san? Neji-nii? Do you mind if Naruto and I leave you for a while?"

"Well actually…" Sora began.

"Good see you!" Hinata waved dragging Naruto behind her.

There was an awkward moment of silence between Sora and Neji. Sora was looking around while Neji chose not to look up for fear of his gaze landing on Sora and having a similar reaction as before.

"Would the young couple like to order?" a waiter came to their table holding a notebook and pen.

"We're not a couple." Neji and Sora said in unison.

The waiter blinked back, "My apologies…um order?"

Neji and Sora ordered their food and waited silently.

"You look…nice." Neji offered casually. '_Pfft what an understatement'_

"Thanks…you too." Sora stiffened slightly.

It was true to say the least. Neji was wearing black formal Hyuuga attire which fit snuggly around his chest and showed off his muscular chest and body. His hair was tied back as usual and his Konoha headband still in place. _A lot_ of girls had stopped to stare, Sora couldn't blame them…

'_Congratulations genius you figured out that he's a guy'_ Sora said sarcastically to herself. She thanked Kami once the food was finally served.

"So…Hinata and Naruto aren't back." Sora said breaking the silence between them.

"Knowing Naruto's appetite, they probably won't be for a while." Neji smirked.

Sora also smiled, "Especially if its ramen."

Neji nodded, glad that the awkwardness had broken…even if was about Naruto it was still conversation, right?

Neji caught a couple of guys on the other side grinning and looking at Sora…inappropriately. He shot a hostile look towards the guys making them instantly turn away as they realized who it was.

"That wasn't necessary." Sora said quietly. Neji looked at her startled, did she want those guys looking at her that way?

"I could have used them for target practice later on." she finished with a shrug.

Neji smirked. There was the Sora he had gotten to know, "I'm sure there will be plenty of other males here tonight you could use for target practice."

Neji realized what he had just said and tried to quickly come up with an excuse as to what he 'really' meant but Sora had chosen to ignore it, for which he was grateful, because he really couldn't come up with anything. The genius that he is.

It was strange how around Sora he would just blurt things out without meaning to, and what ever he'd try to say would come out wrong. But with the way she looked tonight could he really blame himself…goddamn it! What was wrong with him! Yes clearly Sora was a female, but he'd never paid attention to any female before in his life!

Neji and Sora finished their meal and the waiter came back with the check. Sora reached to get the check when Neji took it from the waiter quickly, put some money inside the check book and smoothly gave it back.

"Hey!" Sora frowned.

Neji just smirked.

"You didn't have to pay for me! I was going to pay!"

"Relax it would be very improper if I allowed a girl to pay." Neji shrugged.

Sora continued frowning which almost seemed like a pout as she crossed her arms. Neji thought she looked really cute like that…Neji gave himself an internal jyuuken to the head. Why on earth was he thinking about a girl like that?

"You want to go look for Hinata-sama and everyone else?" Neji asked.

"Yeah, Nala's taking too long." Sora nodded as she got up along with Neji. They began walking through the decorated stands and various decorations which lit up Konoha.

"There's no ramen stand." Sora said quietly. At first Neji didn't know what she was talking about but then it dawned on him.

"You're right. Where else could Naruto and Hinata-sama have gone?" Neji wondered.

"Maybe somewhere…private?" Sora smirked.

Neji didn't want to think about his cousin and friend making out. He made a face which made Sora smile; they stopped on a recently made foot bridge where Neji leaned on the railing looking through the crowds of people. He couldn't help but think how this would look to other people, he and Sora together.

"I think I'm scaring away your fan girls." Sora said coming up next to him, making Neji realize just how close she was. He felt light headed for some reason, but he quickly shook that off and looked over to where some girls were standing looking at him, yet staying far away. Though one decided to be brave and come up to him

"Neji-san, would you like to accompany me to the play?" she asked.

Neji looked at her warily then back at Sora who was hiding a smirk behind her kimono sleeve. He decided to annoy her a bit just out of amusement.

"I'm sorry but I'm here with Sora-san to the festival." he said to the girl who was waiting for an answer. The girl looked shocked and she shot a glare at Sora who had a look of shock and anger across her face, making the girl whimper and run off.

"What the hell, Hyuuga?" she growled.

"She and her friends wouldn't go otherwise." Neji said innocently.

"Yeah you made _them_ leave but how about the rest of Hyuuga obsessed idiots over there." Sora nodded towards a bigger group. It was fun to see Sora get angry and Neji was suddenly feeling very unlike himself as he put on a wide smirk. He snaked his arm around Sora's thin waist and pulled her up close to him.

Sora hissed, "I will rip your fucking arm off if you don't let me go!"

"Come now, it's just until they leave." Neji smirked, inhaling her vanilla like fragrance which all but intoxicated him.

As promised the horde of girls looked devastated and they all ran off wailing. Sora then maneuvered out of Neji's grip making sure to hurt him. Neji massaged his arm.

"Next time you feel like pulling a move like that, keep in mind that its _your_ arm that's going to be dislocated and ripped off." she growled at him.

Neji couldn't keep the smirk off his face and he also couldn't help but notice what Sora was making him feel, all giddy and unusual.

"Do you want to go to the sweet shop over there?" Neji asked. Sora glared at him.

"You can stop the act now; your fan girls are gone."

"I'm not acting." Neji said.

Sora rolled her eyes.

"I'm serious, lets go." Neji said, absently reaching for Sora's hand. The contact sent shivers down his spine and Sora quickly withdrew her hand glaring at him with shocked eyes. Neji ignored the feelings that were raging through him.

"Well, lets go." he said as he began walking towards the shop with Sora cautiously walking next to him.

"Oh kami, they are so cuuuuute together!" Nala gushed looking through the binoculars.

"Neji seems very unlike himself tonight." Hinata smiled.

"Dude, he actually put an arm around her and he tried to hold her hand!" Kiba said shocked.

"Tried is right." Naruto laughed, extremely happy for his two friends, "Though Sora-chan seems _pretty_ pissed."

"Aww he's taking her to the sweet shop!" Nala gushed, then she frowned and punched Kiba's arm, "You never take me to the sweet shop!"

Kiba rubbed his arm, muttering something.

"So when's step 2 of the plan?" Naruto asked, everyone grinned at once.

"Could you just let me pay for once!" Sora said as Neji once again paid for her.

"Stop making such a big deal out of it." Neji said, opening the door for Sora.

"I would if you'd stop paying for me."

Neji sighed as Sora frowned at him. She couldn't stand him right now, he was acting so different and he wouldn't stop shocking her. First with the physical contact which she had to admit freaked her out quite a bit, especially when he pulled her up against him feeling his strong muscles and taking in his rainforest scent. Then when he took her hand she felt electricity jolt through her.

She and Neji went to sit at a table.

"There you two are!" the two turned to see their friends coming up to them.

"Where the fuck have you people been?" Sora grumbled, as they all took a seat.

"We were looking for you." Hinata said innocently.

"Did you two enjoy your date?" Kiba asked grinning. Sora hissed.

"I dare you to say that one more time mutt."

Kiba backed away instantly, while Neji smirked in Sora's direction.

"Well we also stopped by to get this!" Naruto grinned bringing out two bottles of sake.

"Sake?" Neji asked disapprovingly.

"What's wrong Hyuuga, can't take your liquor?" Sora's mood suddenly lifted.

"I don't approve of Hinata-sama drinking."

"Sure." Sora smirked, reaching for a bottle as a grinning Nala handed out shot cups.

Sora poured a shot for everyone, and last for Neji.

"Go ahead." she said sliding the shot to him. Neji frowned looking at the sake, everyone else was already on their third shot. Neji made a face and took in his shot, it left a sort of satisfying feeling.

"Nice." Sora smirked pouring him another.

The night went by with Sora, Nala and Hinata still sober dragging a very drunk Kiba, Naruto and Neji to Sora and Nala's house.

"You sure it's okay if we all stay here?" Hinata asked once they had gotten inside.

"Definitely plus I guess it is kinda my fault Neji got this drunk." Sora admitted.

"Don't worry nii-san needs to let loose once in a while." Hinata smiled.

"Come on Hinata, you and Naruto can take our extra room." Nala said as she and Hinata dragged their boyfriends upstairs.

Sora looked at the drunken Neji sitting on their couch.

"Idiot, I thought you'd be able to handle a little bit of sake." she muttered, putting his arm around her neck and helping him get up to go upstairs.

"Was da matta, is da night already ova?" Neji said sloppily.

"Yes it is Hyuuga." Sora grunted taking him into her room and seating him on the bed.

"Call me *hiccup* Neji. I like it whe*hiccup* when you call me Neji." Neji laid down on Sora's bed.

Sora ignored him, "You've made a mess of yourself." she shook her head at him as she brought a cup of water to him.

"No!" Neji pouted like a kid frowning at the water. He looked adorable. Sora shook her head wiping away what she thought was the sake kicking in.

"You have to drink this." Sora said, trying to get him to take the cup.

"Only *hiccup* if you feed me." Neji grinned. Sora rolled her eyes and kneeled on her bed trying to reach Neji's lips. She brought his head up and put the cup to his lips. He drank the water and smiled.

"Thank *hiccup* you."

A gentleman even when drunk, why wasn't Sora surprised. Sora put the cup on the night table and before she could get off the bed, she found herself under Neji in the blink of an eye. His face inches away from hers and his hair draped on one side.

"What the fuck." Sora tried to kick him off. Neji took her face in his hand it wasn't exactly gentle but firm enough to keep her from wrestling way. Neji's piercing white eyes search Sora's jade shocked ones. She ceased all movement as Neji continued to look at her, his hands gently caressing her face.

"Sora." he sighed he slowly bent down to her neck so that his nose was touching her neck sending shivers throughout her. She heard him inhale deeply and she gulped loudly. She couldn't think straight her mind was telling her that she had to stop this that she should kill him and get him off her; while her other half reasoned that he was drunk and incapable of thinking straight. Another part of her just didn't want to do anything.

"You are exquisite." Neji breathed against her neck, pressing his lips to her throat.

"Get off." Sora whispered, her heart beat quickening.

"And if I don't want to?" he asked pressing another kiss to her neck.

"Please get off."

Neji brought his head back up looking at Sora strangely. His eyes softened, as he leaned in closer to her lips.

"Sora, I would never hurt you, _never._"

Sora closed her eyes feeling his warm breath ghost over her lips; she wanted to believe him but…

"Get the fuck off, Hyuuga." her eyes flashed open as she said the words with so much malice that Neji quickly rolled off her. Sora got up and went to her closet taking out a couple things then she went into the bathroom. She was wary of Neji's eyes on her the whole time.

Sora took a hot shower drying her hair with her fire element then putting on a pair of black ninja pants and a black tank top. She came out of the bathroom putting her clothes away then turning to look at Neji…Sora's eyes widened and she coughed slightly averting her eyes.

Neji was asleep spread out on her bed, with his hair fanned around him. He had taken most of his clothes off leaving him in only boxers, showing off his very muscular form and ivory skin which practically glowed against the dark bed sheets

Sora took out a blanket and went downstairs making herself comfortable on the couch.

"Sora? Sora come on wake up." Nala gently shook Sora.

"Fuck." Sora muttered getting up and rubbing her eyes. Sora looked around her at first surprised then yesterday's night reeled through her mind.

"Hey Nala, where's everyone else?" Sora yawned.

"Kiba is still sleeping in my room. Hinata had to leave early before her father found out and Naruto had a huge hangover but left home, which leaves Neji?"

"Oh him, the bastards asleep in my room." Sora stood up and folded her blanket putting it under her arm and taking her pillow.

"I'll get breakfast ready." Nala nodded.

"Thanks I'm starving."

"Sora, your always starving." Nala grinned.

Sora smirked and went up the stairs. She opened the door to her room and closed it behind her; she looked towards the bed to find Neji, in his boxers, sitting on the side of her bed, and head in his hands. Sora coughed slightly, averting her gaze.

_Must be the sake from yesterday_, she thought to herself.

Neji's white eyes flashed to her face and slid down to the pillow and blanket, his eyes narrowed.

"Where were you sleeping?" he asked her, his voice was rough and husky.

"Couch, never knew it could be so damn comfortable." Sora shrugged going over to the closet and putting away her stuff.

"Really? You want to explain to me why you went to sleep on the couch while I took

Your bed?" he said.

"Oh you were flat out drunk, so I decided to leave you here." Sora ignored how serious he was.

"It's not fair for me to take your bed. You should have just thrown me off or something." Neji went on his gaze was hard.

Sora sighed, "Listen Hyuuga. I know you're trying to be noble and shit, but seriously forget it. Now could you put on some clothes." Sora was looking away from him.

Neji looked down at himself as though just realizing that he was in his boxers. Neji smirked and with ninja speed he was right in front of Sora.

"Why? Am I making you uncomfortable?" he asked.

Sora glared at him, looking up at his eyes and not his chest. "Well you're in my room, in your boxers and there are other people in this house who would fuckin flip if they found us like this."

"Us?" Neji smirked. Even after the worst hangover in his life he still found amusement in teasing Sora. To his utmost surprise sora blushed, a light red tinged her soft pale cheeks.

"Just get changed." she muttered, walking away from him and towards the bed, fixing the sheets. Neji frowned and quickly put on his dress kimono from yesterday.

Sora was going to lift one of the sheets up when Neji beat her to it, his fingers brushing against hers.

"I slept here I'll fix it." Neji said aware that at the brush of their fingers Sora had a look of surprise and quickly withdrew her hand.

"Whatever." she muttered turning away.

Neji began fixing the bed, "What did I do yesterday, when drunk?" he asked Sora. He figured that something had to have happened and seeing as he couldn't recall anything after his first shot he resorted to asking her.

"You just drank and you, naruto and kiba got drunk so us girls brought you here." Sora said quickly. Neji narrowed his eyes.

"And what happened after you brought me here?"

"Uh…you slept?" she answered sarcastically.

"That's it?" Neji asked.

"Why were expecting something more?"

"I don't know, but if I remember correctly I was 'flat out drunk' and for someone to be that drunk and just calmly go to sleep…" Neji trailed on.

"Sora! Breakfasts ready!" the two heard Nala call from downstairs.

"Yes, breakfast." Sora sighed in relief. Neji looked at her and her obvious attempt to dodging the conversation…hmm dodging…

Sora opened the door and turned to look at Neji; "You can use the bathroom over there." she nodded towards the door next to her desk. Neji nodded and Sora left.

He went into the bathroom, first looking around. It was the same as the room, elegant, tidy.

After Neji came out of the bathroom, he looked over at sora's bed which he had been sleeping on. The bed was a miracle worker for sure. The exhilarating fragrance of vanilla soothed his headache and left him at ease. It was the same fragrance that all but radiated from Sora. Neji cautiously went over to the bed and took a pillow, at first just looking at it then raising it up to inhale the scent. It was amazing; the scent calmed him immediately and cleared his mind.

"Kiba, hun can you go tell Neji that breakfast is ready. He's in sora's room." Nala said.

"Yeah, yeah sure." Kiba trudged up the steps. He opened Sora's bedroom door and his mouth fell agape. There stood the Hyuuga Neji, known also as the ice cold emotionless bastard, with sora's pillow to his face, inhaling deeply.

"No fucking way." Kiba breathed. In an instant Neji had his hand around Kiba's throat shoving him against the wall. Kiba couldn't help but grin, even though he could barely breathe and that slam to the wall just hurt him.

"You like her."

Neji's eyes widened at these words, "How do you know?" he asked.

"It's obvious." Kiba said rubbing his neck once Neji had let him go.

"How?"

"You know for a genius, you're pretty dim in the love department."

Neji frowned, "And that's gotten me to jonin and your still way behind."

Kiba smiled, "Dude take it from me. You are falling for Sora and you're falling hard."

"But how would you know that. How would I know?" neji asked, unable to stop himself from asking.

"You don't know it. It just…sort of happens." Kiba shrugged walking over to the door.

"You're not going to tell anyone about this are you?" Neji asked.

"Course not, I'm not that type." Kiba grinned.

"Thank you." Neji nodded.

Kiba saluted and turned to the door, but he stopped before going out. "Oh and just so you know. _Love_ doesn't make us weak…it makes us stronger."

Neji furrowed his brows and Kiba left. Right now he wouldn't dwell on things that weren't clear. First thing to do was to find out what happened last night and Neji prayed to dear kami that it wouldn't be that bad.

Sora was out training when she heard the slight rustle of leaves.

She straightened up from her fighting stance and sighed leaning crossed armed against a tree. "I see you've picked up the habit of annoying the fuck out of me."

"It's so nice to be greeted with such kindness." Neji rolled his eyes appearing near Sora.

"So what'll it be, spar with taijutsu or weapons?" Sora asked looking through her pouch for a lollipop.

"Actually I wanted to talk."

"Again taijutsu or weapons?" Sora asked unfazed as she unwrapped the candy

Neji sighed getting into a stance.

"Taijutsu it is then." Sora smirked throwing the lollipop into the air and catching it neatly in her mouth.

Neji noticed how Sora was much fiercer then their usual spars. Whatever he did, or if he did, must have really pissed her off.

"You said you wanted to talk." Sora said throwing a round house kick to which Neji skidded back and dodged.

"What did I do yesterday?"

"You're still going on about that, Hyuuga? Why do you think you did something? Its not like you destroyed anything like Lee."

"Let me rephrase my question." Neji caught Sora's fist and pulled her close to him.

"What did I do to _you_?" Neji felt light headed as he realized how close she was. Both of them were breathing heavily and Sora was glaring at Neji. She roughly pushed him backwards making Neji fall on his ass.

"Stop this Hyuuga; I don't like what you've been doing these past few days."

"Why are you dodging my question?" Neji asked making sure to put an emphasis on 'dodging' it worked. Sora's eyes narrowed and she crouched down near Neji, looking him square in the eye. Her jade eyes emitting pure rage, it sent a shiver through neji's body and it wasn't the bad kind.

"I don't know what's going through your mind right now, but whatever makes you think that you could ever do anything to me? Yesterday night I took you to my room and was nice to you. I didn't kill you for what you did because you were drunk and that would be overreacting." Sora said still glaring at neji. "You didn't do anything worth mentioning yesterday. So you caught me off guard and you probably thought I was someone else, all you did Hyuuga was bring me under you on the bed and tell me that you would never hurt me." Sora's glare was getting angrier by the second and Neji was nearly breathless.

"Did I kiss you?"

Sora snorted, "No, do you really think you would be alive right now if you did?"

Sora got up then and held out her hand to Neji, "So now that you know you didn't do anything yesterday, get up. We still have a fight to finish."

Neji took her hand instantly, making his body practically jolt instantly. Expressions on Sora's face flitted so quickly Neji was wondering if he was just seeing things.

"No way!" Nala shrieked.

"Well yeah." Kiba said covering his ears.

"I can't believe it! He likes her, he really likes her!" Nala cheered.

"_He _likes her, but Sora _hates_ Neji." Kiba pointed out.

"We'll just have to fix that now, wont we?" Nala grinned slyly.

Kiba gulped, "I don't like the 'we' part"

Neji dodged a kick to his head from Sora. During the fight a thought came to his mind.

"Don't you have parents?" Neji wondered, aiming a hit to her stomach. Sora frowned and hit Neji's hand back, aiming a punch to his gut.

"Not anymore, none of us do…Orochimaru made sure of that." Sora replied bitterly.

"Don't you have a surname?" Neji wondered. None of the girls had ever used a surname.

"Not really. Our surname was erased along with our clan." Sora said, bending down and kicking Neji in the side. All the while unwrapping a lollipop and sticking it into her mouth.

Neji grunted and staggered back.

"You four come from the same clan?"

"Yeah. Why do you think we have such a strong connection?"

Neji hit a chakra point in Sora's arm.

"What's your clan name?" he asked.

Sora threw back her fist, coating it with fire and punched Neji right in the gut, slamming him into a tree. She moved the lollipop to the other side of her mouth.

"Nekiego."

She then turned around and jumped off.

**Ta-dum! Sooo? What did you think? I finally got down some past on our main characters. Yay!**

**Please leave a review! It would make me sooo happy ^^'**


	8. Chapter 8

**Chapter 7**

Sora was walking home when Sakura came running up to her.

"Sora-chan. Ohayo!"

"Yo." Sora raised a hand, waiting for Sakura to catch her breath.

"Tsunade-sama wants to talk to you and Nala. Nala said she was going to meet you at the Hokage tower." Sakura explained.

"Thanks sakura. Say hi to Lee for me." Sora nodded and was off in a flash.

Moments later she appeared at the front of the Hokage's door. Sora knocked loudly.

"COME IN!" came Tsunade's voice.

Sora entered the office, quickly throwing away her lollipop. Nala waved to her cheerfully; Sora bowed quickly and went to stand next to Nala.

"Now girls I called you here for a very important task." Tsunade began. As she said this she rolled out a small scroll. "As you are aware I sent Sai and Hikari on a mission. They have sent me a message but I can't seem to decipher it and nor can the deciphering team. I'd like you to take a look." Tsunade turned the scroll to them.

Nala and Sora peered at the scroll and smiled, "Its Hikari she's using our special writing language." Nala smiled.

"Well? What does it say?'

"This isn't good." Sora frowned, "She says that the mission is more then it seems and the enemy has been notified of them. Their in hiding now, waiting for the perfect time. But all forms of messages are being infiltrated."

"They need back up and fast." Nala said a worried look crossed her face.

Tsunade nodded, "Shizune, get your team and go! Quickly!"

"How about us?" Nala asked.

"No this isn't a mission for you two. That's all girls, thank you. Dismissed." Tsunade said.

Nala and Sora turned around to leave.

"Wait Sora!" Tsunade called.

"Yes Hokage?" Sora turned around.

"I need you to deliver this message to Hiashi Hyuuga, at the Hyuuga compound. Do you mind?" Tsunade explained holding out a scroll.

Sora let out an internal sigh. Hyuuga's. "Of course not Hokage-sama."

Sora took the scroll and met up with Nala outside. "I'll be back home soon okay Nal. I gotta run this errand for Tsunade."

"Okay. I won't be back till later though; Kiba's mom invited me for dinner."

Sora nodded and went off towards the Hyuuga compound.

At the gates of the compound the two guards approached her.

"Can we help you miss?"

"I was sent by Hokage-sama to deliver this scroll to Hiashi-sama."

The guards nodded. "Go right in."

Sora nodded her thanks and stepped into the Hyuuga compound. She looked around clearly lost.

"Can I help you? You look lost." a guy maybe a few years older then her approached Sora. He had the same white-lavender eyes as all Hyuuga's and long hair tied at the back. He wore anbu clothing with a tattoo on his right arm.

Sora bowed in respect and looked around. "Actually I am a little lost. I'm looking for Hiashi-sama; I have a scroll here for him, from the Hokage."

"No problem I'll lead you to him." the guy smiled warmly.

"Thank you." Sora said.

"I'm Otori by the way." he held out a hand.

Sora thinking it rude to turn away from him shook his hand, "Sora."

"Pretty name for a pretty girl." he smiled, leading her down a hall.

Sora stiffened slightly.

"I don't think I've seen you around before." Otori said.

"I'm kind of new to Konoha." Sora said, looking around the compound.

"Really? You must not know your way around here then. How about I…"

"Otori-san." a voice interrupted him. Sora and Otori turned to the guy standing behind them.

"Neji-san." Otori bowed.

"Sora, what are you doing here?" Neji turned to her.

"Here to deliver a scroll to Hiashi-sama." Sora waved the scroll.

"Very well, I will take you to him. Otori." Neji nodded goodbye and began walking. Sora followed after him and let out a relieved sigh.

"What were doing with Otori?" Neji asked, glaring at Sora.

"What do you mean? I was fucking lost, and he came to help me." Sora glared back.

"Do you know who he is?"

"Uh…Otori Hyuuga?"

Neji let out a frustrated growl, "He's a womanizer. He could have taken advantage of you."

"Advantage? Of me? Are you forgetting who you're talking to? I could whip his ass any day." Sora humphed, crossing her arms. "Besides why are you so fucking riled up about this, Hyuuga?"

Neji glared at her and looked away. "We're here." he muttered, knocking on the sliding doors.

"Enter."

Neji opened the door and gestured for Sora to go in first.

Sora came in through the doors and bowed respectfully. "Hiashi-sama."

Neji bowed as well, "Uncle."

"Neji? What is it?" Hiashi looked up from various scrolls. "Who's your friend?"

"This is Sora. She comes bearing a scroll from the Hokage." Neji explained.

Sora went over to the Hiashi, bowing again and giving him the scroll; Hiashi accepted the scroll and looked Sora over.

"No surname?" he asked, his lips forming a thin line.

"Sora Nekiego, Hiashi-sama. It is an honor to meet the esteemed head of the Hyuuga clan."

Hiashi nodded and gave a small smile, "You have very good manners, child."

Hiashi opened the scroll and read through it, "Well this is very good. I approve. Neji will take you to meet Hanabi right now, you may start her training whenever you're ready."

A look of confusion crossed Sora's face and she bowed her head. "I don't believe I quite understand what you mean Hyuuga-sama."

"Hasn't Tsunade informed you? Strange. Well here you go this might clear things up." Hiashi gave her the scroll and Sora's eyes scanned through it quickly.

"I…um…understand now, thank you." Sora bowed, edging closer to the door.

"Very well. Neji please escort Sora to Hanabi." Hiashi said. Neji nodded and he opened the door for Sora. Neji was quite confused.

Sora followed Neji a good distance from Hiashi's room before she blew up.

"Why the fucking hell wasn't I told about this! Goddamn it!"

Neji rolled his eyes. He was extremely surprised at the way Sora behaved around Hiashi and even Otori. Mannerly and…nice. Of course he knew that it was probably just an act.

"What exactly is going on?" Neji dared to ask.

"Apparently your uncle requested a mentor for his daughter. Specifically a fire-jutsed one."

"And Tsunade didn't tell you?"

"Fuck no!"

"It can't be that bad right?" Neji said.

Sora was silently fuming.

"What?" Neji asked.

"Forget it." Sora grumbled.

"Come on, tell me." Neji asked again. He was really curious.

"Screw off."

"Only after you tell me." Neji smirked.

"Persistent bastard aren't you?"

"Only when I want to be." Neji smirk grew wider.

"You'll eventually see anyways." Sora sighed.

"Neji?" a young girl came up to him.

"Hanabi, there you are. Meet your new trainer, Sora." Neji introduced her.

"Yo." Sora smiled awkwardly.

"Are you strong?" Hanabi immediately asked.

"Strong enough." Sora shrugged. Neji rolled his eyes.

Hanabi nodded and took Sora's hand, taking her away.

"Whoa…where are you taking me?" Sora asked.

"Training grounds." Hanabi replied simply. Sora looked at Neji then back at Hanabi. She shook her head and sighed giving up. "Damn you Hyuuga's are persistent."

Neji actually smiled at that one as he followed after the two, interested to see what would happen.

Hanabi and Sora stood in the training grounds as Neji leaned against a wooden post on the sidelines observing them.

"So do you know any fire jutsu's?" Sora asked.

"Just two." Hanabi answered. "Fire needles and a giant fire ball."

"Okay here's what I want you to do. Use your fireball jutsu and aim it at me okay?" Sora directed.

"But…you'll get hurt!" Hanabi's eyes widened.

"Trust me, I won't." Sora smiled, standing there with her arms opened. "Go ahead; give me your most powerful shot."

Hanabi nodded, a determined look crossing her face. She took a stance and held up a seal. She made various seals and took in a deep breath letting out fire.

A medium sized fireball rolled its way fast to Sora. Sora just stood there.

"Aren't you going to move!" Hanabi cried.

Even Neji had tensed up looking at Sora.

Sora just stood there and raised a fist. When the fire ball came really close to her she opened her fist and the fire dispersed.

Neji let out a breath he didn't know he was holding.

Hanabi was shocked. "Whoa! What was that? How did you do that?"

"First of all. That wasn't too bad, though it needs some work and second." Sora walked over to Hanabi. "I have an affinity for fire. I control the element; the fire would never harm me."

"You control…? Is that possible?" Hanabi asked wide eyed.

Sora shrugged, "I just showed you didn't I? I control fire. I just…will it to do whatever I want; I don't need the use of jutsu's."

"So how are you going to teach me jutsu's if you don't know any?" Hanabi wondered.

Neji was surprised to see Sora's face turn slightly red. "It's not that I don't know jutsu's. On the contrary controlling fire I have to know a lot…but…I just don't use them since…well my chakra isn't all that amazing…after using a jutsu my chakra gets depleted after one move. That's why I don't really use it." Sora rubbed the back of her head nervously.

Neji smirked. So that's what she was talking about earlier. She doesn't have much chakra, so making it hard for her to train somebody that doesn't use the same fire technique as her. "I guess this is why Tsunade chose you for this task." he said walking up to the girls.

"What do you mean Hyuuga?" Sora asked, glaring a little at him.

"Well there plenty of other fire users Tsunade could have chosen. But she knew about your chakra problem so she had you train Hanabi in order to widen your chakra capacity." Neji explained.

"A little heads up would have been nice." Sora grumbled. Then she sighed and turned to Hanabi. "Well let's give this a try, huh?"

Hanabi nodded enthusiastically.

"I'm going to teach you the fire cage jutsu." Sora put a finger to her lips and smiled slyly at Neji. "Now watch and observe, Hanabi. Your cousin here will help us demonstrate."

Sora went through five seals slowly so Hanabi could learn them.

"Fire style: fire cage!" Fire burst out and formed a cage right around Neji.

Sora breathed heavily as she tried to regain her breath. "You see Hanabi? This jutsu is very useful to catch your enemies. Isn't that right?" Sora asked Neji.

Neji glared at her through the fire surrounding him, crossing his arms.

"Can I try that?" Hanabi asked excitedly.

"Of course. He doesn't mind, do you Hyuuga?"

Sora made the fire disappear as Hanabi gave it a try. She wasn't able to do it the first time, but on her fifth try she managed to hold the cage for about 10 seconds before releasing it.

"That was great Hanabi! You even managed to burn hyuuga a bit, wait to go!" Sora grinned. Hanabi smiled.

Neji grimaced at his burnt sleeve.

"Can you show it to me again, Sora-san? I think I might be able to do it afterwards!" Hanabi asked.

Sora looked unsure for a moment then nodded. "Okay, watch closely."

Sora slowly went through the seals again. She was breathing heavily even before the fire caged Neji.

Neji watched Sora with concern as she sank to one knee, one eye closed as she gasped for air.

"Sora that's enough release it." Neji said.

"I can still keep it up. You can't tell me what to do." Sora failed to glare at him through her tiredness.

"You're overexerting yourself." Neji tried to reason. This time she did glare at him then she turned to Hanabi with a forced smile.

"You see Hanabi. You focus on the shape and try to withstand it. Chakra-control is your most powerful weapon"

"Coming from…?" Neji glared at her.

"Okay Sora-san I got. Please release it now. You look really tired." Hanabi said worriedly.

"Don't worry about me I'm fine." Sora said. But she released the jutsu anyways, falling to the ground on both her knees and hands, trying to regain her breath.

Neji called to a Hyuuga helper, "Water!"

The woman bowed and ran to get water

"Forget it. Go on Hanabi try the jutsu now."

"But…"

"Try it." Sora wheezed out.

Hanabi nodded unsurely and turned to Neji, making the seals and trapping Neji once again in a cage of fire. This time she held on to it for almost a minute.

"Great going Hanabi. But you didn't burn Hyuuga this time." Sora managed to smirk.

Hanabi laughed "We're all Hyuuga here Sora-san. I think you should call Neji-nii-san by his name."

Neji fought the urge to rapidly nod his head in agreement.

The Hyuuga helper ran to the grounds, bringing a tray of water, bowing as she held it to Neji.

Neji took one glass and gave it to Hanabi then took another glass and crouched down next to Sora, taking her chin in his hand and tilting her head up raising the glass to her lips.

Sora's eyes widened in surprise and she quickly backed away from him.

Neji was a bit surprised but hid it as he offered the glass to her silently.

Sora took it and drank from it. All the while Hanabi looked at the two curiously; they gave the cups back to the helper and Sora staggered up to her feet.

"Are you feeling better, Sora-san?" Hanabi asked.

"Of course. Nothing a little rest won't solve." Sora told her reassuringly.

"Well then come on lets go to my room for a while." Hanabi said taking her hand and taking her away.

"Bye Neji-nii-san!" Hanabi called over her shoulder.

Sora looked over her shoulder at Neji once and turned back.

Neji stood there and after Sora and Hanabi disappeared he walked to his room plopping down on his bed and looking up at the ceiling. What compelled him to do that to Sora, he didn't know. And the concern he was showing for her…unnatural.

But he couldn't help it. The thought of Sora being injured made him want to protect her. To help her. Anything but see her that way.

"So why exactly do you have two beds in your room?" Sora asked plopping down on one.

"I usually have friends over." Hanabi shrugged. "Like now. You should get some rest Sora-sensei."

Sora laid down her eyes drooping. "I should probably be getting home, but…" Sora immediately fell unconscious.

A faint knock came from the door and Hanabi quickly slid the door open.

"Hanabi…is that Sora?" Hinata's eyes widened looking at the unconscious form of her friend.

"Yeah. I think she fainted from chakra exhaustion." Hanabi frowned.

"Oh dear." Hinata ran up to Sora, checking over her and feeling her forehead for any signs of a fever. "Yes you're right Hanabi."

"Think we should take her to the hospital?" Hanabi asked, worriedly.

Hinata smiled and patted her sister's head. "It's alright. She just needs rest, but we'll look after her any ways."

"Should we tell Neji-nii-san?"

"If you think its necessary, why not?" Hinata smiled sweetly.

Hanabi nodded and ran off. Hinata continued to smile warmly as she thought of her cousin and Sora. '_Those two' _she shook her head.

Neji got up to the sound of knocking at his door. He slid the door opened and looked at his little cousin in surprise.

"Neji-nii-san! Quick I think Sora fainted from chakra exhaustion!" Hanabi cried out.

Neji's eyes widened and he cussed under his breath as he ran past Hanabi towards her room.

"Cousin, cousin, cousin." Hanabi slyly smiled and shook her head.

Neji knelt down beside Sora. First checking her pulse rate then putting a hand to her cheek then forehead.

"Damn it, sora, I told you." he muttered.

Even while worrying over the fact that Sora could probably catch a fever. Neji

couldn't help but think about how soft her skin was.

Without realizing it he began caressing her cheek. Then he traced his fingers softly down her slender arm to her hand. He took her hand in his, noting how soft it was and not calloused as it should be with all that fighting and weapon wielding she does.

All the while the two Hyuuga sisters watched their cousin through a small crack in the door.

"Is Neji-nii-san in love with Sora-sensei?" Hanabi whispered/asked her sister.

"He is. But I don't think he's realized it yet." Hinata smiled.

"Why can't he be a little more like Naruto-nii-san and express his feelings openly?" Hanabi wondered.

Hinata blushed and felt her heart warm up when her sister referred to Naruto as older brother. He seemed to be winning his way into the Hyuuga clan's heart already. Even her father had asked how 'Naruto-kun' was doing earlier on; Hinata was practically glowing when she answered him.

Neji was still caressing Sora's skin when a gust of wind blew into the room from the open window.

'_Sora I'm staying at Kiba's tonight. Don't forget to take your pills!_'

Neji was surprised to hear Nala's voice in his ear. Maybe it was something she could do with her wind affinity…but wait, Sora has pills? Neji looked down at Sora wondering where she kept her house keys. He activated his byakugan and found the keys in her right pocket.

Neji went to the door and opened it swiftly, "H…Hinata? Hanabi?"

"Uh…hi Neji-nii-san…um you want something?"

Neji sighed. It looks like he was being spied on. "Look after Sora until I come back." with that Neji disappeared and reappeared in front of Sora's house. He went in and went straight up to Sora's room. There on her night table was a container of pills. Curious, Neji read the label.

"Pills that make you numb and sleepy?" Neji murmured after reading the label, with a frown etched onto his perfect features Neji left the house and went back to Hanabi's room.

"Where's Sora?" Neji asked, for Sora was no longer in Hanabi's room.

"My friend is coming over so we moved Sora-senpai to your room." Hanabi shrugged, hiding her grin.

Neji paled and ran out of the room to his own room. He slid the door open and his eyes widened. Sora was on his bed, her face red and his blankets draped over her frame…shit! Neji went over and put his hand on Sora's forehead. She was burning up with a fever; Neji quickly removed the blankets away from her, and called for a servant.

"Get me ice cold water and a towel. Hurry!"

The servant bowed her head and ran off quickly. Meanwhile neji removed sora of her pouches, scrolls and blades. Sora seemed to regain consciousness as she whimpered slightly. She groaned as though in pain and her hand immediately flew to her right hip frantically itching it and keeling over in pain.

The servant brought the towel and water and Neji quickly sent her out closing the door.

"Sora?" Neji asked. Sora let out another agonizing whimper of pain. "What the hell is the matter?" Neji took Sora's hand away from her hip and gulped before taking her shirt just a bit up so he could see her hip. Neji's eyes widened in surprise. On her hip was a tattoo of fire flames and it was glowing bright red, as though it were actually on fire.

"The fuck?" neji muttered. He took the towel and immersed it in the ice cold water before putting it on Sora's forehead and patted her cheek with it as well.

Neji kept up with the rhythm of patting her face with the towel then once again immersing it in the cold water.

"Neji?" Hinata asked behind the frame door.

"Hinata! I need you to contact the Inuzuka house."

Hinata came into the room gasping quietly once she saw Sora. "What's wrong?"

"I'm not sure but if I'm not mistaken Nala should be in the same state. She is currently at the Inuzuka house. Hinata quick!"

Hinata nodded and ran out of the room straight to where they kept the pigeons; she scribbled a quick note to Kiba and sent the bird off. She waited impatiently for an answer. Hinata couldn't believe the state Sora was in. It wasn't natural at all and Neji…Hinata had never heard Neji sound so desperate and vulnerable. After 5 minutes the bird came back, with a note in Kiba's messy handwriting.

'_Nala is the same! I don't know what to do! She has this tattoo on her shoulder of air that's glowing and she keeps saying it hurts! If Sora is the same do you think Hikari and Talia are as well?_'

Hinata ran back to Neji's room. "Neji! Kiba says that Nala is in the same state though she has a tattoo of air that is glowing and hurting!"

Neji looked at Hinata then back at Sora with a grimace. "As I thought." he uncovered Sora's tattoo. "Sora also has a tattoo, glowing red."

"What could this be?" Hinata wondered. Taking the towel from Neji as Neji sat beside Sora on the bed and Hinata proceeded to try and lower her temperature.

"I don't know. But Sora probably has it worse then any of them, due to chakra exhaustion and fatigue. It has to be something between the four of them." Neji rubbed his face and looked at Sora, who was still wincing in pain and clutching her hip.

"What are we going to do cousin?"

**~o~o~o~**

**Dun-dun-dun…*eerie background music***

**Well I hope you enjoyed the double update. You can all thank invincible shadow for that! Another shout out to my first reviewer! And also a thank you to those who've read my story so far! \(^.^)/**

**And by the way the next update may come a little later then expected since my vacation is almost over and school starts on Sunday *sighs* so my apologies in advance for a 'probably late update'…forgive me?**


	9. Chapter 9

**Chapter 8**

Hinata and Neji stayed with Sora, trying to calm her fever down, but it seemed as though nothing would help the pain she was going through right now.

"I'm really worried about her." Hinata once again took a look at the burning mark on Sora's hip.

Neji continued to just stare at Sora, "Hinata, it's getting late maybe you should go get some sleep."

"Will you look after Sora?"

Neji gave her a look that clearly said 'you think?'

Hinata left her cousin's room with a small smile on her face.

_**Sora walked into the kitchen of the Akatsuki lair, on the other side of the large room Kisame was lying down in front of the TV switching the channels repeatedly.**_

_**Sora reached up for the cupboard that held the sweets when someone came and stood in front of her, too close in front of her.**_

"_**Move out of my way Blondie." Sora grumbled, crossing her arms.**_

"_**What if I don't want to, beautiful?" Deidera smirked.**_

"_**I wouldn't be hitting on Itachi's girl if I were you Deidera." Kisame called out**_

_**Deidera looked Sora over lingering on her body more then her face, "You're hot, sexy and young I can see why any male would want you, even Itachi. But I haven't seen him make any move in claiming you as his." Deidera leaned in closer to her.**_

"_**I'm not an object, now move before I experiment on how clay would react when spontaneously burnt." Sora glared at him, lifting her palm upwards and making a ball of fire appear.**_

_**Kisame chuckled loudly.**_

"_**Come on gorgeous, don't be like that." Deidera grinned, snaking an arm around her waist and pulling her closer to him.**_

_**In a second Deidera was on the ground, flat on his back clutching his jaw. Sora turned to see Itachi Uchiha glaring down at the blond.**_

"_**Touch her and I'll kill you." Itachi send with unwavering malice. His tone was so dangerous it made Kisame sit up in shock and Sora shiver slightly.**_

_**Itachi then took Sora's hand and dragged her away.**_

_**Kisame laughed aloud at Deidera, "What'd I tell ya?"**_

"_**Fuckin hell, damn Uchiha." Deidera groaned, wiping away the blood from his lips.**_

"_**Itachi?" Sora questioned as Itachi continued to drag her down various halls until they reached his room. Itachi held the door open for her and Sora hesitantly went in.**_

_**Once Itachi came in after her he closed the door shut and took Sora's arm turning her around and slamming her against the door, leaning his body in against hers.**_

"_**Itachi?" Sora gasped slightly**_

_**Itachi caressed Sora's cheek his warm breath ghosting over her lips, "Do you doubt how much I care for you?" he asked his voice was husky, as he leaned closer to Sora, tilting his head slightly so that they're lips were but millimeters apart.**_

_**Sora wrapped her arms around Itachi's neck, "Never." she whispered before closing the remaining space between them.**_

_**They kissed passionately and Sora began unbuttoning Itachi's akatsuki cloak letting it drop to the floor as the two made their way to the bed.**_

_**They fell on the bed with Itachi on top of Sora. Their tongues engaging in a furious battle.**_

_**Sora's hands roamed Itachi's chiseled chest, feeling his strong muscles and chest beneath his shirt. Sora gripped the hem of his shirt trying to yank it off of him, when Itachi took her hands in his and stopped their kiss, moving his lips to her ear.**_

_**He was slightly out of breath and his voice was husky as he whispered in her ear, "We can't Sora I've already told you that."**_

_**Sora pouted and propped her self up on her elbows; Itachi was still straddling her waist.**_

"_**Yes but I still don't get why?"**_

"_**You're still young Sora, your only 16, I don't want to taint you." Itachi stroked her cheek.**_

"_**Taint me with what, though?"**_

"_**A murder's hands." Itachi sat up, looking away.**_

_**Sora rolled her eyes, "I've killed a fair amount of people myself Itachi."**_

"_**Yes, but your whole clan?" **_

_**Sora winced slightly, "That's different…you had no…" Sora stopped herself and looked at Itachi's frozen figure.**_

_**He sat at the edge of the bed, his elbows on his knees and chin resting in his hands; Sora couldn't stand seeing him like this. She got off the bed and stood in front of him, crossing her arms.**_

"_**It's still not a good reason. I love you, and you say you love me as well, so what's stopping us?"**_

"_**Sora…" Itachi looked up at her jade eyes.**_

"_**So your saying that if I stripped down in front of you right now you still wouldn't take me?" Sora smirked.**_

_**Itachi's blood boiled, "That depends are you offering to strip in front of me?" he allowed a small smirk of his own.**_

_**Sora grabbed on to the hem of her black shirt pulling it up over her head and grinning when she saw Itachi's eyes widen and the loud gulp she heard from his throat. She stood in front of him with her black, lacy bra; with an evil smirk sora threw the shirt beside Itachi and turned on her heels walking away to the bathroom Itachi had in his room. Her curvy body teasing him.**_

"_**I'll be taking a shower if you don't mind." Sora closed the door behind her, locking it.**_

_**Itachi's eyes were still wide as he felt his blood rush south, "Fuck."**_

Neji tried to hold Sora down as the pain she was probably suffering increased ten fold.

"Damn it." Neji wiped his brow. What was he supposed to do? He had no idea what was going on with her and how to ease the pain.

Sora let out a soft whimper and she winced. Neji blushed when Sora held out her hands and grabbed his arm, pulling him towards her. Not knowing what possessed him he slid into the bed next her and turned himself to face her.

Neji brushed back a strand of ink black hair as he stared at the now, slightly calm, Sora. Neji continued looking at her with a frown on his face. He wanted to know what he was feeling. Why he acted this way towards Sora; he wanted to understand.

Neji put an arm around her and to his surprise Sora clutched the front of his shirt, snuggling closer to him and burying her head in his chest as she endured the pain.

Neji's breath hitched and he tried to calm his raging nerves down. He felt like he was holding an angel in his arms, with the power she was captivating him with. An angry angel…a fallen angel.

Her fever had lessened, to Neji's relief and now all was left was the searing pain of her tattoo…at least that's what Neji assumed.

After a tiring day and night Neji finally fell asleep, still holding Sora close to him.

The next morning Neji woke up with a slight yawn. He looked down at the peaceful form of the girl next to him and he smiled, caressing her cheek.

"Neji-nii-san how is….oh my…"

Neji's eyes widened as he saw Hinata at the door, her hands covering her mouth.

"Uh…Hinata! I…" Neji tried to get up from the bed but to his dismay Sora wound her arms around his waist.

"Itachi." She sighed with a smile.

…

Neji felt his heart stop. Itachi! She calls out his name! He's fucking dead!

"Itachi? As in Sasuke-kun's brother Itachi? Neji-nii-san how does Sora-chan know him?" Hinata looked extremely confused.

Neji was fuming on the inside. He was angry and confused, but most of all hurt.

"Sora was very close with the Uchiha. Apparently they were in a long relationship." Neji all but spat out. He roughly got out of the bed and put on his shoes. He took his headband fastening it around his forehead.

"Hinata, just leave Sora here. She's fine now." Neji went off thinking that if Sora could happily mention Itachi she was more then fine.

Hinata stared after her cousin and looked back at Sora. She closed the door after her and immediately went over to Ichiraku Ramen, to meet up with Naruto and the gang.

_**Sora hung from heavy chains in an empty chamber. Her head was bowed down and her clothes were covered in blood.**_

"_**Come on now sweet heart. Just tell us what you know." Kisame frowned, leaning against Samehada.**_

_**Sora shook her head and didn't look up, "I can't." she whispered**_

"_**I don't want to hurt you anymore, Sora. We've all taken a liking into you and even Samehada doesn't want to hurt you."**_

_**Sora stayed silent. They didn't understand. She can't tell them anything. She can't; she wanted to…so badly. Curse that snake bastard for putting this jutsu on her.**_

"_**I'm sorry sweet heart." Kisame sighed, raising Samehada up.**_

_**An agonized scream echoed around them and Sora tried her best to keep her screams silent, but the pain was too much to handle.**_

_**Sora raised her head and was met with intense, red sharingan eyes. "Itachi." She murmured softly before falling into a genjutsu.**_

"_**Come on Itachi, that's enough." Kisame put a hand on Itachi's shoulder.**_

_**Itachi shrugged out of his partners hold and went out of the dark chambers. Outside he punched a hole in the wall clenching his teeth. **_

"Damn. So that's who Nala was talking about." Kiba looked awed.

"What do you mean Kiba?" Ino asked.

"Well, she told me that Sora got out of a bad relationship with someone. She never told me who though." Kiba explained.

"Uchiha Itachi. I can't believe it." Naruto shook his head.

"Like you always say Naruto. Believe it." Shikamaru sighed.

"How's Nala doing, Kiba-kun?" Hinata asked.

"She gave me a scare last night…she went through a lot of pain. This morning though she went back home saying she needed to sort things out." Kiba put his chin in his hands.

"Could Sora still be in love with Itachi?" Sakura wondered.

"But Itachi is dead now." Lee pointed out.

"Who knows? Maybe she still has feelings for him." Tenten shrugged.

"I can't believe Sora lasted that long with the Akatsuki." Chouji frowned, digging into a bag of chips.

"I'm not surprised I mean those girls were Orochimaru's pawns right? They probably used to be S-classed criminals." Ino said arrogantly.

"Hey! That's not true! They had no choice but to work for him!" Kiba frowned at the blonde who just turned her head away.

"They're trustworthy ninja. They serve Konoha loyally." Shikamaru pointed out.

"Yeah! They're our friends!" Naruto agreed.

"That's right. It doesn't _really_ matter that Sora used to be with a highly dangerous S-classed criminal in Akatsuki by the name of Uchiha Itachi." Ino rolled her eyes, "I wonder if instead of sex they would go kill innocent villagers."

"That's enough Ino. Sora is a comrade. A fellow Konoha ninja." Sakura glared.

"Her past doesn't matter." Lee nodded.

Everyone was silent as they pondered over that.

"Dear fucking kami." Sora groaned waking up, "What the hell happened?"

Sora looked around the room. She noticed it was a tidy yet simple room and it smelt of the rainforest. Sora's eyes widened as she jumped out of the bed. She tip toed towards the door, opened it a bit and looked out.

"Holy hell." She was in the Hyuuga compound, in what she believed to be neji's room.

Wincing a bit in pain and clutching her hip she opened the only window in the room and jumped out of the window.

"Sora? Thank kami!" Nala sighed in relief as she opened the door for her best friend.

"What just happened to us?" Sora got straight to the point as she and Nala sat in their living room.

Nala looked frightened for once in her life, "I…I don't know. I'm worried about Hikari and Talia. The same thing had to have happened to them."

"Do you remember the last time this happened to this?" Sora said her gaze straying from the room and out to the window.

"Yeah…" Nala said softly. "It was when we were kids and the elders entwined our destinies together."

Sora nodded, "What could this mean then?"

"_**The time has come for the new generation of Nekeigo elementals to realize their destiny and unite their elements!" an old, long white-haired man announced standing before at least a hundred of his clan's people.**_

_**An elder woman stepped forward. Her dark grey hair was long and reached her knees her eyes were the only part of her that remained lively, a fierce emerald.**_

"_**I call upon the element of fire which has resided in my granddaughter. Sora Nekeigo step forth."**_

_**A small girl about the age of five stepped onto a fire symbol on the ground. Her emerald eyes looked as fierce as her grandmothers but her whole body was shaking in fright.**_

"_**I call upon the element of water which has become one with my granddaughter. Step forth Hikari Nekeigo." Another elder man called out. He wore traditional Japanese clothes and his old age was evident to those around him.**_

_**A six year old girl stepped onto the water symbol carved into the ground. She gave a small smile to the girl across from her and the younger girl gave her a nod back.**_

"_**I call forth my granddaughter, Talia Nekeigo, who the earth element has possessed as her own." An old woman called out. She had natural white hair but that she was old and withered away was clear on her features.**_

_**A short white haired girl stepped up next to Sora on the earth element symbol.**_

"_**And last I call forth Nala Nekeigo, my granddaughter who possesses the air element." An old man said. He was the only one who gave a reassuring smile to his granddaughter, a smiling green haired girl who skipped onto the air symbol.**_

_**The oldest elder of the Nekeigo clan, Hitoshi the man who spoke first, held his hands together in a jutsu sign as did the grandparents of the four girls.**_

"_**The four previous elements. Lightning, Rock, Lava and Snow are ready to pass on their destiny of protecting our clan to their grandchildren. The new generation of elementals." The elder announced, "let us start the binding ceremony."**_

_**The five elders all began forming a jutsu around the four girls. A bright light filled the middle of the girls as their eyes widened in surprise and astonishment.**_

"_**Lava!" elder Hitoshi shouted out. Immediately the woman with fierce emerald eyes dropped to the floor and her granddaughter cried out as a burning feeling reached her hip, she lifted up her shirt a bit to see the same symbol she was standing on tattooed on her hip.**_

"_**Snow!" the same thing happened with Hikari though on her ankle.**_

_**Elder Hitoshi was having a hard time controlling the jutsu now that two were dead.**_

"_**Rock!" Talia glanced at her dead grandmother in shock and tears streamed down her cheeks from the pain of losing her beloved grandmother and the pain on the small of her back.**_

"_**Lightning!" Elder Hitoshi shouted out last and Nala clutched her forearm all the while bending down to her grandfather, crying.**_

"_**The binding has been complete. The new generation of Nekeigo elements have their fate sealed and bonded they have become and bonded they shall forever remain." Elder Hitoshi fell to a heap on the ground.**_

_**A loud round of applause rang through the crowds and the four girls glared at the applauding people. How dare they celebrate when their grandparents were dead by their feet? Should they not show an ounce of respect to the previous elementals who spent their lives protecting the clan?**_

"_**Ah wonderful! How marvelous I finally get to see first hand how the famous Nekeigo clan form their four elementals." **_

_**The crowds gasped when they heard and saw a long haired man on top of a snake grinning down at them. The snake man turned his head to the four girls, "such power in such small bodies, you would do perfectly for experimenting."**_

_**Before anyone could react the entire Nekeigo clan was wiped out by the snake man. Not a single soul left except for the four frightened girls.**_

"_**Come here, elementals. That's right don't be frightened. Where will you go now that you have no home or family?" the snake man cackled.**_

_**The four girls turned to run but their enemy was faster and to their utmost horror they were all being carried away by the snake man, Orochimaru.**_

The sound of something scratching against the window had Nala and Sora wake up from their reminiscing and run over to the window.

"It's from the Hokage!" Nala brought the bird inside taking the Hokage marked scroll from the bird's claws.

"What's it say? Any news on Hikari?" Sora asked peering over Nala's shoulder.

"Hikari's in the hospital!" Nala gasped.

Sora was at the door already and Nala quickly followed her as they ran through the streets of Konoha towards the hospital.

"Hikari! Which room?" Nala practically yelled at the receptionist.

The woman frantically searched through her papers, "R…Room 306." She looked up to see the two girls but they were gone.

"Hikari!" Nala was already in tears.

"Hey you guys. I missed you." Hikari winced as she tried to get up.

"Don't." Sora pushed her down lightly, "What the fuck happened?"

Hikari laughed softly, "Nice to see you too, Sora."

"H…Hikari did you go through what we went through?" Nala said wiping away her tears.

Hikari nodded, "I was a burden for the team. Sai had to carry me all the way to Konoha since I was apparently out cold and injured from our fight on the mission."

"So? What's it mean? What's happening to us?" Sora asked frowning as she took out a lollipop. She felt like it had been ages since she had something sugary.

Hikari, being the oldest and naturally wisest, sighed and said, "It means we have to go to Tsunade and request permission to meet up with Talia."

"Talia? What do you mean Hikari? How are we even going to contact her?" Nala's eyes were wide. Sora also looked surprised.

"Do you guys remember the last thing Elder Hitoshi said before he died…about us I mean."

Nala thought hard but shook her head.

"Damn it. We are so screwed." Sora cussed, shaking her head, "_bonded they have become and bonded they shall forever remain. _Those were his last words."

"Wait…doesn't that mean that the four of us have to be by each others side…forever?" Nala asked.

Hikari nodded sadly, "why do you think our grandparents were always seen together? Going on missions together, defending the village together. The only time they were apart was when they were with their separate families."

"Our houses were right next to each other." Sora rolled her eyes.

"We've already been away from talia for a long time now. Maybe this was a sign." Nala pointed out.

"Yeah. But what happens if we stay apart for _too _long?" Sora was the one to ask the dreaded question.

"It can't be death." Hikari shook her head.

"So the main question here is what do we do?" Nala said. "Talia won't come back to us and the only other option is us going to her."

"Which is as sure as fucking hell itself not happening." Sora glared.

"Then the last option…we cancel the jutsu that has bonded us together." Hikari said simply.

"And that's going to happen…how?" Sora asked.

"First things first we all need to gather somewhere, with Talia." Nala said.

"It has to take place back where we first became bonded…you guys remember the symbols carved on the ground right?" Sora and Nala nodded, "Then we all summon our elements and if I remember correctly there was a jutsu written on the stone in the middle of the symbols."

"Maybe that's the jutsu! We can repeat it and see if it un-bonds us!" Nala nodded her head.

"Great plan and all you guys, but first things first. Where do we find Talia? And Hikari, you're still injured from your mission."

"Sora. Contacting Talia is all up to you. Your elements are the closest." Hikari said, "And don't worry about me, I'll be fine in a day or two."

Sora grumbled something under her breath and sighed, "I don't want to try and contact Talia. But I'll do it anyways!" she said quickly when Hikari and Nala sent her glares.

"Great. Now that that's settled I'm going to go buy flowers for Hikari." Nala hugged Hikari and went out the door. Sora followed her with a sigh as she gave Hikari a goodbye wave.

"Come on Sora lets go to the Yamanaka flower shop. We can say hi to Ino while we're there!" Nala skipped about with a gloomy Sora behind her.

After a few minutes Sora stopped and Nala continued on skipping. She stopped and looked back at the glaring Sora.

"Wha wong, Sowa?" Nala giggled.

Sora rolled her eyes and jabbed a thumb at the sign above her 'Yamanaka Flowers'

"Oops!" Nala laughed as she skipped backwards and opened the door to the flower shop. "Hiya Ino-chan!"

Ino turned around with wide eyes as she looked at Nala and Sora, "H…Hi, what's up?"

"We're here to buy flowers for Hikari. She's in the hospital." Nala explained.

"And you guys? I heard about what happened." Ino leaned on the counter.

Sora tensed up a little, "you know about that?"

Ino smirked a little, "_trust_ me Sora. _Everyone_ knows about _that_."

Sora looked at Ino a bit confused, "Well…um…we're fine now."

"Yep! Mint condition! So you got any tulips Ino? Those are Hikari's favorites."

"Of course, Nala. I'll be right back!" Ino ran off.

"Yo, nala. Don't you think Ino was acting a bit weird?" Sora asked.

"Weird no? Besides she's our friend like everyone else. They were probably really worried about us." Nala giggled.

A worn out Neji came back to his room after an excruciatingly painful training. He went all out on the poor training field and had bruises on his knuckles from punching everything so hard and sometimes without chakra.

He expected to find Sora still asleep on his bed but she wasn't there. Most surprising of all his room was extremely clean. Not that it's not always really clean. But it seemed as though sora had fixed things around in his room. Made the bed, emptied out the water in the bowl and set them neatly on the night table. The place was literally sparkling.

Neji sat down on his bed and looked around his room before lying down and staring up at the ceiling. His bed smelt of her vanilla fragrance. Neji turned his head to breathe in more of the scent. It was so calming and it immediately made his mind clear and his body relax.

He groaned a little. What was the matter with him? First sleeping next to Sora, freaking out when she uttered itachi's name. Driving himself way past exhaustion in anger. And now this? Desperately trying to inhale in more of her vanilla scent. Since when did he, Neji Hyuuga act like this? All for a girl!

But she wasn't just any girl, no. After a pretty long while of knowing her Neji still felt as though she were shrouded by mystery. She was the strongest kunoichi he had ever met and he had yet to meet a girl who fought like Sora. Her temper was one to fear but to Neji it was one her most amusing attributes. She wasn't girly like Sakura or Ino or tomboyish like Tenten, she was fierce in battle and had a sharp tongue but she knew when to be polite and mannerly and respected her elders. She was an enigma to him and no matter how much he thought about it he knew that whatever she did, even if it was the same thing over and over again, it would never cease to amaze him.

Her vanilla fragrance captivated him and her beauty stunned him. Her ink black hair with white ends that contrasted deeply. Her pale, soft skin and those electrifying emerald eyes that held him where he stood were astounding. Her smile would lighten him up and her laugh was such a sweet, gentle sound that he wanted to hear more. Especially if he was the one to make her laugh.

Her body…Neji recalled the previous night when he held Sora close to him, wrapping his arms around her thin yet curvaceous form. The way she too held him close made Neji's heart beat five times faster…but then again.

Neji's anger returned as he knew that Sora was probably thinking about that Uchiha all the while. Every time she'd cuddle closer to him, Itachi's image must have been in her mind. Her heart had probably died along with Itachi's and Neji's own pounding heart cracked a little.

He knew it was impossible. Sora could never love him, she had a frozen heart. All Neji could do now was still his beating heart and never show his true feelings to Sora. Neji hoped that Kiba could keep his loud mouth shut…of all people _he_ had to know. Sora wouldn't believe him though, so Neji was lucky.

"So, Nala, Sora. You two will come to Ichiraku Ramen this evening right?" Ino asked.

"Yeah. Kiba's going to be there." Nala said like it was the most obvious thing in the world. With the way their relationship was going, it was probably was.

"And you sora?" Ino turned to the raven-haired girl.

Sora shrugged, "If it involves food, count me in."

"Great!" Ino smiled, "so see you guys tonight! And say hi to Hikari for me!"

"Will do Ino! See ya!" Nala waved while Sora just nodded at Ino and left.

Nala and Sora walked towards the hospital once again.

"Hey nal. I'm going to go back home, okay? Take a shower and stuff. I'll meet up with you at Ichiraku Ramen."

"Okay!" Nala grinned.

Sora waved and jumped onto the roofs making her way back to their house. Once she reached home she lay down on her bed and gave out a low sigh. How was she going to contact Talia?

Sora had only done that once before and Talia was sitting right next to her. They spoke to other in their minds then laughed about how cool that was.

She needed to concentrate like hell if she wanted to contact Talia.

Sora took a shower, changed and dried her hair with her fire element. Then she sat on her bed cross legged and began to concentrate hard. After a full five minutes of concentrating Sora sighed and fell back on her bed. This wasn't working; she needed to go somewhere else.

Sora let out a frustrated growl as she opened her eyes from her sitting position on a tree branch in the training field. It wasn't working; no matter how hard she tried she couldn't focus enough to contact Talia.

"I know you're there." Sora grimaced slightly.

"I'd be surprised if you didn't." Neji smirked leaning against the trunk of the tree on the branch next to Sora's. "I thought you hated to meditate."

"I do. And I don't get why you like it so much. It's goddamn frustrating!"

"So why _are_ you meditating?"

Sora brought her knees up to her chest. "I'm trying to contact Talia. Now if only this fucking meditating would work."

Neji raised a brow in question. The earth elemental, Talia?

"What happened to me yesterday happened to my friends as well. Hikari thinks it's a sign and that we have to meet up somewhere." Sora explained, "It's not like we know where Talia is and since my element and hers are the closest I have to try and contact her."

"I don't understand. What did happen to you yesterday?" Neji sat down.

Sora looked at Neji for a bit before letting out a sigh. She told him everything about when she was younger and the bonding jutsu.

"…And now Hikari thinks that if we get together and go back to our old village we might be able to undo the jutsu."

Neji was listening intently to every word she had said. Not only because it was highly interesting and he was learning more about Sora but also because she trusted him enough to tell him. "Close your eyes."

Sora looked up at him confusedly. "What?"

"You have to contact Talia don't you? Close your eyes." Neji hopped onto the branch in front of her and sat cross-legged.

Sora sat the same way and closed her eyes, "This isn't going to work, Hyuuga. I don't have the patience to meditate."

"This isn't all for you now is it Sora? Think about Hikari. Nala. Even Talia. The pain they each had to go through because of this bond. You want to help them, I know because you treasure your friends and they believe you will help them." Neji said watching as Sora's expression softened.

"I've never let them down before." She said quietly.

"And you never will. Trust me." When Neji said this Sora opened one eye and closed it when Neji gave her a slight glare.

"Now I don't know how exactly you contact each other but for now I want you to clear your mind of every thought." Neji began. "And when your mind is absolutely clear, think about Talia, picture her in your mind."

Sora listened to Neji. His voice was surprisingly soothing and soon she was lost in her mind. She pictured Talia in her mind like Neji said. Sora began reminiscing of old times. She remembered teasing Sasuke to no end with Talia and when they stole Kabuto's glasses. She remembered all the happy times they shared together with their friends.

Out of no where Sora felt like she was running through a forest. The image of the forest was right in front of her as she dodged trees and ran at ninja speed. But…this wasn't her; it couldn't be her she could still subconsciously hear Neji's voice talking to her.

Whoever was running through the forest turned their head to look at a raven –haired boy running next to them. Sasuke!

"Talia." Sora said hesitantly.

Suddenly the person was no longer running and the raven-haired boy looked surprised as he walked back.

"_Sora? Wh…what are you doing?"_

"_There's no time to talk. I know you probably went through hell yesterday just like the rest of us. But you need to go to our village, we'll meet up with you there." Sora said quickly._

"_Sora what do you mean? What's happening? I thought it was only happening to me?"_

"_Talia! Just shut up and listen to me. Hikari knows what she's doing and if you could just forget about that Sasuke bastard for one second and care about us again! You have to meet us at our village back where we were first bonded. 3 days Talia, if you don't show up I will personally hunt you down."_

And just like that Sora was ripped away and she landed back into her own body. She looked around frantically and found herself in the same position sitting in front of Neji who was looking at her calmly.

"Did you make contact with Talia?" he asked.

Sora nodded, "Yeah. That was as weird as hell and I can't believe it worked. Thanks Hyuuga."

Neji gave her a smile, "You trusted me enough to tell me your story, it's the least I could do."

"I gotta go tell Nala and Hikari. See ya Hyuuga, thanks again." Sora then jumped off the branch and disappeared.

"Anything for you." Neji whispered, closing his eyes.

"3 days. That's more then enough to get ready and get to our village." Hikari nodded after Sora told them everything.

"It looked as though she were in the fire country." Sora noted.

"So…now to ask Tsunade if we can go." Nala said.

"She'll definitely say yes." Sora shrugged.

"What do you mean, NO?"

"Calm down, Sora." Tsunade rolled her eyes.

"I'm sorry Hokage-sama. But this is very important; it might be a matter of life and death for us." Hikari explained.

"You are asking me to grant you the permission to go to a place where there will most likely be S-classed criminals. How do you know whether they won't set up a trap?"

"Talia can't do that. She knows what's happening to us and if we don't go to meet up with her who knows what will happen to us next!" Nala cried out.

"Hokage-sama, please. You have to let us go." Sora reasoned.

Tsunade sighed and massaged her temples. "Fine you can leave tomorrow morning…"

"Yes!"

"…but! I will send three others with you."

"Three? Isn't that a bit too much?" Sora blinked back.

"This is Akatsuki we're talking about besides I need to know for certain that you'll be safe and these three will make sure you are." Tsunade smirked.

There was a knock on the door and three guys entered, "Hokage? You called for us?" Kiba asked waving at Nala.

Standing next to the girls were Kiba, Sai and Neji.

"I'm sure the girls will or have explained to you what's going on. You leave tomorrow. Dismissed."

The six teenagers were walking towards Ichiraku Ramen to meet up with the rest of the gang.

"They wouldn't set up a trap, would they?" Neji asked

"No definitely not. Even though we're on different sides now, Talia wouldn't do that to us. She'll probably come with Sasuke and that's it." Sora contemplated.

Neji gave a nod and when they reached Ichiraku ramen he sat in between Sora and his cousin with Naruto next to Hinata.

Sora looked around the faces of her friends, nobody was really talking and the atmosphere seemed full of tension.

"So…does anyone want to order?" Sora asked a bit nervously.

"sure." Nala said slowly looking at everyone around her, then she laughed a bit awkwardly, "So what's up? Anything new with anyone?"

"I found out something pretty new yesterday." Ino shrugged.

"Really?" Hikaru was holding Sai's hand as he wrapped an arm around her.

"Yeah. It was something _very _surprising." Ino continued.

"Maybe we should order!" Sakura burst out saying.

"Sakura that's not very nice. Ino probably has something important she wants us to know." Nala smiled.

"Well actually Nala. I'm sure everyone knows about this…at least they do now." Ino narrowed her eyes.

"That's enough Ino, we already told you to let it go." Shikamaru sighed.

"Shikamaru's right." Tenten agreed.

"I'm pretty confused right now." Sora shook her head.

"It's nothing, Sora-chan." Hinata said a bit too quickly.

"Hey, it's not nice to keep secrets from your friends." Nala grinned.

"Kind of hypocritical don't you think? Especially when Sora didn't tell us about her ex-boyfriend."

Everyone looked at Sora whose eyes were wide and she was frozen in her spot.

"Ino!" Sakura hissed.

Naruto let out a nervous laugh, "It can't be true though, right Sora-chan?"

A lot of people sent Naruto glares. The entire atmosphere was full of tension and everyone was silent.

…

"Anyone want the last chip?" Chouji offered. Chouji's offer went unacknowledged.

"I don't know how any of you found out about this but this conversation is over, let us move on." Hikari said her gaze had hardened.

"So it's true then? Sora was with the Itachi Uchiha?" Ino made no notion of dropping the subject.

Next to Neji, Sora had tensed at the mention of the Uchiha's name. How did they all know? The only people who knew about this were Hikari, Nala. Himself…oh shit! Hinata!

Neji quickly looked at his cousin. "I'm sorry Neji-nii." She whispered.

Neji turned to the Yamanaka, "Ino that is enough. Sora does not have to…"

He was interrupted by Sora herself, "What do you want me to say? Yes I admit it's true. Now what?"

Ino smirked in triumph and Sora looked very pale.

"Sora…" Nala whispered a look of hurt on her face.

"But Sora why did you keep this from us? From Konoha? We could have gotten a lot of information on the Akatsuki." Sakura couldn't help but ask.

"Sora doesn't have to answer to anything." Hikari frowned.

"It doesn't matter now anymore, does it Hikari. I don't care." Sora stood up abruptly and ran off with ninja speed.

Nala stood up about to follow Sora, "No Nala, you know how Sora is. She wants to be alone now." Hikari shook her head then she turned back to the rest of her friends, "that was uncalled for and if we knew that this would be an interrogation we wouldn't have come."

"Can't you see that it hurts her? What's wrong with all of you?" Nala sat back down next to Kiba.

Everyone else looked either ashamed or guilty, even Ino looked a bit regretful.

"You call yourselves ninja. You acted without thinking of the consequences, now the whole of Konoha will know about Sora." Hikari stood up without saying anything to Sai and she and Nala left.

Neji felt as though it was mostly his fault everyone knew, in his state of anger he let his guard down. Exactly what a ninja shouldn't have done.

He walked towards the training field he and sora always go to and he found a figure sitting underneath a tree, Sora. She had her knees up and head down.

She couldn't be crying? Could she? Neji came closer to her and sat next to her leaning his back against the tree propping his arms on his knees. He didn't say anything at first. Sora probably already knew who was sitting next to her.

"…I'm really sorry about what happened, if I had known they were planning to question you I would have told you."

Sora raised her head and Neji was surprised at the look in her sad jade eyes.

"It doesn't matter. People would have eventually found out wouldn't they? So it doesn't matter."

"But it _does_ matter. To you it matters. I know you're trying to be cool about this but I know that it's just a cover for how much it upsets you and worries you. You're thinking about what everyone else is going to say now aren't you? How they're going to look at you and what they're probably already thinking about you?"

"Stop that." Sora frowned.

"Stop what?"

"Getting into my head. And all this caring shit, it doesn't suit you."

Neji smirked, "Sorry."

"You have nothing to be sorry about." Sora sighed lowly.

Neji begged to differ; this whole thing was his fault. She was right though this whole caring thing it wasn't him, he didn't do that with anybody. He couldn't care less about anyone else.

"Why are you always he one to see me at my weakest?" Sora asked out of no where.

Neji blinked back. Why _was_ he always the one?

"I hate that so much. I hate that you're next to me right now, seeing me like this."

Neji felt a pang of hurt in his heart as though she had shot him down.

"But for some strange reason you have a soothing presence. And for another strange reason you seem to understand me."

Neji smiled, "maybe its destiny?"

"Again with the destiny talk? I don't get you and your liking for destiny. If you ask me destiny isn't all that great. We never know what is or when it's actually here." Sora looked up at the sky.

Neji just watched her, "maybe that's what's so great about it. Destiny may not only be one thing. Destiny may lead to a second chance at something. A new beginning."

"Second chances. New beginnings. They seem too hard to look foreword to." Sora mused, getting up.

Neji got up as well, "Destiny will find her way towards you. For all you know it could be right in front of you." Neji walked away a little, "Come on I'll walk you home."

Sora caught up with him, "I forgot to thank you for yesterday. You…took care of me and I'm sorry about that."

"Don't be. And forget it, you would have done the same right?" Neji smirked, teasing.

A look crossed Sora's face and she smiled slightly, "yeah, I probably would have."

Neji's eyes widened, he was not expecting that answer from Sora. Maybe all hope was not lost. It seemed that Sora's heart was melting. Even if it was a little it was still worth it.

"Come on Hyuuga, hell itself will freeze over by the time you catch up." Sora rolled her eyes ahead of him.

"I'm faster then you."

"You…fuck no! I'm faster!"

"No, I believe I'm faster."

"No your not you asshole, I am!"

"Okay."

"Okay?"

"Yeah." Neji shrugged smirking.

"Tch…" Sora frowned but smiled in the end shaking her head, "Hyuuga."

**~o~o~o**

**Well that was Chapter 8 I really hoped you enjoyed it…so much that you would leave a review…*wink, wink, nudge, nudge***

**I updated a bit late so sorry about that but school's started and I have my IGCSE's to worry about and TOEFL as well as my SAT's in march…yep *sweat drops* the 11th grade sucks, big-time.**

**Anywho thanks a bunch to those who've taken the time to read my story. I really appreciate it. Until next time everyone! Bye-ya!**


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